YOU CAN”T MAKE THIS STUFF UP: Amnesty International holds a press conference in Jerusalem, but hates Israel so much that it advertises “Beirut time.”

Two notable things about Beirut. First, it’s controlled by Hezbollah, a terrorist organization with no respect for human rights. Second, it’s the capital of Lebanon. For decades, where Palestinians are denied citizenship, and, per Wikipedia, “they are also legally barred from owning property or entering a list of desirable occupations. Employment requires a government-issued work permit, and, according to the New York Times, although ‘Lebanon hands out and renews hundreds of thousands of work permits every year to people from Africa, Asia and other Arab countries… until now, only a handful have been given’ to Palestinians.”

Not that Amnesty cares about this because it can’t bash Israel with that information, but you would think they would at least be sensitive to the optics of refusing to even acknowledge that its press conference is in Jerusalem and instead alluding to the capital of perhaps the most anti-Palestinian country in the Middle East.

“TOO MANY ASIANS”: University of Pennsylvania Law School professor Amy Wax is being threatened with sanction by her school for expressing opposition to immigration to the US from Asia. Wax did not suggest she has anything against Asians as such; she just does not want any more Democratic voters, and Asian Americans mostly vote for Democrats. I have a variety of objections to her argument, but that’s neither here nor there.

As Glenn pointed out, the irony here is that progressives are so up in arms about Wax’s remarks, which have no actual effect on public policy, but are silent or even supportive as top universities impose implicit quotas on Asians. The universities try to disguise this bias, but progressives have been explicit about their hostility to Asian American success for a long time. Consider this interview with Bill Clinton from 1995:

“Our diversity is our great strength,” [President Clinton] declared. “If a university says, ‘Look, we’re only going to let in qualified people, but we think that the life of the university will be strengthened if we had different kinds of people,’ then I think that’s a legitimate thing.” Otherwise, he added, “there are universities in California that could fill their entire freshman classes with nothing but Asian Americans.”

There is a right answer to that, and it’s “so what?” People don’t come stamped as “Asians” or “whites” or “Hispanics.” These are labels we impose on them. In the case of “Asians” we impose on people with ancestry in places as varied as India, Mongolia, and Indonesia. If people from these backgrounds excel academically, and collectively take up even the whole freshman class at Berkeley, *so what*?

But we know, “so what?” It’s a way of trying to rally whites to be for racial preferences by suggesting that otherwise their children will be displaced by “Asians.” (I can’t find a link, but I remember a Congresswoman making this argument explicitly back in the 90s.) In other words, “diversity” concerns become an excuse for quotas against Asians. It’s gross and it’s racist, and unlike what Wax said, it does suggest hostility to Asians, as such. And it’s high time someone called progressives on this sort of thing.

THEY PROBABLY THINK JEWS SHOULD MOVE TO BIRIBIDZHAN: A marketing firm that works with Jewish groups, Big Duck, has nixed a potential client because of its Israel ties. No self-respecting Jewish group would continue to work with Big Duck. Which unfortunately means that some left-leaning Jewish groups likely will continue to be its clients.
UPDATE: It’s worth noting that the organization Big Duck is boycotting, the Shalom Hartman Institute, is left-leaning, though not “anti-Israel.” Consider, for example, this seminar: “In November 2017, thirty leading theorists and practitioners convened for a day of thoughtful discussion on topics of power and privilege. The group, comprising academics, rabbis, Jewish communal leaders, philanthropists, activists and educators, explored crucial questions of how gender, class, and race impact the distribution of authority and influence in Jewish communal life.” When the revolution eats its own, Jews tend to be the appetizer.

NOW AVAILABLE FOR PREORDER: Classified: The Untold Story of Racial Classification in America.

JAMIL DAKWAR, ACLU “HUMAN RIGHTS” PROGRAM DIRECTOR, CHANNELS DAVID DUKE: Thus demonstrating the confluence of two trends: the decline of the ACLU from a principled (if often wrong-headed) liberal civil liberties organization to far-left activism, and the normalization of antisemitism on the far left so long as it can be somehow tied to Israel.

THE REALITY-BASED COMMUNITY–NOT!: A Reality Check for Progressives on the Rittenhouse Case: “In these and many other instances [of armed self-defense during the summer 2020 riots], there is not a white nationalist, or a vigilante, in sight. Just people, usually local residents, trying to protect their neighborhoods from chaos and destruction while the police stood down, usually on orders from superiors.”

AMERICAN PARENTS ARE TERRORISTS, BUT PFLP FRONTS ARE NOT?:

WE LIVE IN ORWELLIAN TIMES:

Also:

IN FAIRNESS, THE PRESIDENT IS SAYING THE SAME THING; OTOH, HE IS SUPPOSED TO BE A *FACT-CHECKER,* AND THE IDEA THAT $3.5 TRILLION IN SPENDING ISN’T A COST IS AN EGREGIOUS ORWELLIAN LIE:

“INFLUENTIAL RABBIS” VERSUS “PRINCIPLED PROGRESSIVES”: The New York Times actually published the excerpt below, though they have since stealth-edited out the rabbis part. In 2021 America, it’s woke to portray a legislative battle in Congress as war between the principled and rapacious Jews. Note for the uninitiated: There is, in fact, no “rabbis lobby” of any consequence.

NOT THE BABYLON BEE: Scientific American: Why the term ‘JEDI’ is problematic for describing programs that promote justice, equity, diversity and inclusion.

This is stuff that would get a C- and an “oh, come on” comment from a professor even somewhere like Oberlin (I think): “Although they’re ostensibly heroes within the Star Wars universe, the Jedi are inappropriate symbols for justice work. They are a religious order of intergalactic police-monks, prone to (white) saviorism and toxically masculine approaches to conflict resolution (violent duels with phallic lightsabers, gaslighting by means of “Jedi mind tricks,” etc.).”

.

BY AMAZING COINCIDENCE, BOTCHED MEDIA NARRATIVES ARE ALWAYS FAVORABLE TO THE DEMOCRATS: New York Times Botches the History of Budget Conflicts and Government Shutdowns.

EVER WONDER HOW FILIPINO AND PAKISTANI AMERICANS WOUND UP IN THE SAME “ASIAN AMERICAN” CLASSIFICATION, DESPITE HAVING NOTHING IN COMMON: If you would like to read a more academic and shorter preview of my forthcoming book on racial classification in the US, the final version of my article, The Modern American Law of Race, has been published and is available for download here.

By the way, the answer to the question above isn’t simply, “both groups are from Asia,” because Persians, Armenians, Turks, Arabs, and other “Asians” are classified as white, not Asian American.

BOOK RECOMMENDATION: Nevergreen, by my friend Andrew Pessin, a biting satire of woke campus life.

THE TALIBAN IS TREMBLING IN FEAR:

THEY ARE CONFUSING A HOLIDAY OF MOURNING WITH SOMETHING THEY WOULD LIKE TO CELEBRATE: Tonight marks the Jewish Holiday of Tisha B’Av, which commemorates the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem by the Romans, the murder of tens of thousands of Jews in Israel in the course of putting down the Jewish Revolt, and the beginning of Exile, i.e., the almost two thousand year stretch in which Jews had no sovereign state in the Land of Israel. Jewish Voice for Peace, a small group of largely Jewishly unaffiliated, far-leftist Jews who hate Israel and get their funding primarily from non-Jewish far-left foundations, sees this as something to emulate rather than mourn.

JUST IN CASE YOU FORGOT DURING THE PANDEMIC HOW MUCH FUN IT IS TO DEAL WITH OUR AIRLINE MONOPSONY: Recently, I booked a last-minute ticket on Delta. I used flight credits from a pre-pandemic flight that was canceled, no new payment required. I rushed to the airport with my family, and tried to check in. No dice. I went to the counter. The man behind the counter told me that I need the credit card used to purchase the ticket. I explained that (a) I did not use a credit card to purchase the ticket, given that there was no charge; and (b) I don’t have the credit card the system is saying that I need to present (which I assume was saved in my Delta profile). Nevertheless, the Delta employee insisted that I needed to show the credit card I used to purchase the ticket. The ultimate resolution was that he had to cancel and then rebook the ticket, a process that required him to call into the Delta call center and which took almost an hour. We would have missed our flight but for a fortuitous weather delay–all because I couldn’t present the card I used to purchase the ticket, which never actually happened. I would have been mollified by an apology by Delta after I alerted them to what happened via their Twitter help handle, but nothing.

IF THIS IS SUCCESS, I’D HATE TO SEE WHAT FAILURE LOOKS LIKE: Chicago has been releasing accused murderers pretrial. Defending this policy in the wake of recent carnage on Chicago’s streets, the city’s chief judge notes that “out of 181 defendants charged with murder and released pretrial, only seven of them missed at least one court appearance, only 11 were charged with a new offense before trial, and of those 11, only two were charged with violent offenses.” Most criminal acts are never reported to police. Most that are reported to police never lead to criminal charges. So if 11 suspects were *charged* with a criminal offense after release, one can presume that the actual number of offenders was more like in the 50 to 100 range, or somewhere around one-third and one-half of those released. This is what passes for success in Chicago.

WAIT, HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH CLAIMED THAT THESE VACCINES WERE NO GOOD AND THAT BY OFFERING THEM TO THE PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY ISRAEL WAS BEING RACIST: After Palestinians reject deal, Israel to send 700,000 vaccines to South Korea. Human Rights Watch and similar groups, which once had a proud history of standing up for human rights, have become propaganda factories for the far left. Here is Ken Roth of HRW, making up a phony obligation by Israel to provide the PA with vaccines, and then buying PA lies about why they wouldn’t accept vaccines when offered.

WHY DOES ISRAEL RECEIVE SUCH DISPROPORTIONATE ATTENTION, AND CRITICISM?: Israel’s Critics are Repulsed by Jewish Sovereignty and Military Power.

The most important conclusion from all this is that criticism of Israel’s use of military force cannot easily be reduced by Israel “behaving” differently. It’s not how Israel uses force that is the primary source of criticism, but ideologically based repulsion at Jews collectively exercising military power via their sovereign state, at all. This is why, in my experience, when critics of Israel claim that Israel is using “disproportionate” force, one can never pin down what level of force these critics would accept. If the IDF’s very existence is repulsive to them, and Israel is deemed inherently illegitimate, no amount of force can be acceptable.

IN SHORT, THEY SERVED AS WILLING PROPAGANDA AGENTS FOR HAMAS: The Spectator: The problem with the New York Times’ Gaza coverage. H/T Hans Bader.

IT’S THE WELL-BEHAVED KIDS WHO WILL PAY: Hans Bader: Education Department may encourage racial quotas in school discipline.

ALL THE FAKE NEWS FIT TO PRINT: Hans Bader: New York Times spreads propaganda from terrorist group Hamas.

VOX BEING VOX: Zach Beauchamp credulously quotes a far-left source: “Palestinian leaders have condemned antisemitism publicly and repeatedly.”

The Palestinians have two actual, elected (albeit in 2006) governments, Hamas and the Palestinian Authority. Hamas is literally a genocidal antisemitic organization. The head of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, is a long-time Holocaust denier, who more lately focuses on denying Jewish history in Jerusalem. The most popular Palestinian leader currently out of power, Marwan Barghouti, is in an Israeli jail for directing several terrorist murders of Israeli civilians–after Israel had offered the Palestinians independence in 2000. The Palestinian public in the Territories is among the most antisemitic in the world. The idea that the tie between antisemitism and Palestinian nationalism has been invented by Jewish organizations to “reinforce lurking anxieties that advocacy for Palestinian rights is inherently antisemitic” is maybe, along with the claim that Palestinian leaders routinely condemn antisemitism, perhaps the most gaslighty thing I’ve read all year. Beauchamp reports it, though, without comment. Of course, Beauchamp also once thought there was a bridge between the West Bank and Gaza.

Even if we are extremely generous, and assume that the source only meant prominent American Palestinians, the claim is still extremely dubious, and it’s also very unlikely that, say, Rashida Tlaib has more influence on pro-Palestinian rhetoric and actions than the actual Palestinian leadership, especially given that the perpetrators of recent antisemitic violence seem primarily to be immigrants.

THEY LIE, AND THEY THINK YOU ARE THAT STUPID: Rep. Mark Pocan lies about Israel having “segregated highways.”

One of the leading Israel-haters in Congress, Pocan told the Washington Post that “when he traveled to the region, he saw segregated highways and ‘that does remind me of an old South Africa, right?'” The South Africa analogy seems to make it clear that he was referring to racial or ethnic segregation.

There are certain roads in the West Bank, mostly near Jerusalem, that drew consistent terrorist attacks on Israeli drivers when they drove near Palestinian towns, resulting in many deaths and injuries. So Israel built bypass roads for cars with Israeli license plates. These cars could be driven by Jews or Arabs (over 20% of Israel’s population), but not by Palestinian drivers who are not residents of Israel, who could still use the old roads. Even that policy was restricted by the Israeli Supreme Court, which held that one major road from Jerusalem could not be restricted because it found that Palestinians did not have a good alternative. A new Jerusalem highway has separate lanes for Palestinian residents of the West Bank who have Palestinian license plates, and for those with Israeli license plates, to allow Palestinians access without providing terrorists an opportunity to attack Israeli drivers.

These are the “segregated roads” Pocan was referring to. Unlike South Africa, they have nothing to do with race, and everything to do with distinguishing between Israeli citizens and residents of all ethnicities, and West Bank Palestinians. Similarly, for security reasons Israel law forbids Israeli citizens from entering Area A of the West Bank, which is under Palestinian Authority security control. There is no racial or ethnic bias behind these rules, only security concerns because of terrorism.

So I called Pocan out on his lie on Twitter.

Pocan easily could have ignored my Tweet. He also could have claimed that when he said “segregated” he simply meant segregated between Israelis and non-Israelis, which is unfair, in his opinion, even if it’s not race-based. As a law professor colleague claimed on Pocan’s behalf, he could have argued he had been imprecise, and clarified that he was not referring to South Africa-style racial segregation.

Instead, he doubled down on the lie, and then, remarkably, accused me of lying.