Next time you hear the Palestinians and their supporters whining, remember hundreds of thousands of Jews lost their ancestral homes when forced to leave Arab countries and they aren’t demanding any ‘right of return!’
Yemenite Jews en route from Aden to Israel, during the Magic Carpet operation (1949–1950). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_exodus_from_Arab_and_Muslim_countries
By the way, has the US (the Obama Administration) officially recognized this report? From the Jerusalem Post(hat tip: Jeff):
Canada, early on Tuesday, accepted the recommendation of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development that “Canada officially recognizes the experience of Jewish refugees who were displaced from states in the Middle East and North Africa after 1948.”
The recognition came following the committee’s November 2013 report on Recognizing Jewish Refugees from the Middle East and North Africa.
The committee “learned of the discrimination and hardship faced by Jewish people living in the Middle East and North Africa in the 20th century,” according to the report.
Further, said the report, “almost all of the Jews in Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Syria, Tunisia and Yemen eventually left their homes and communities, which had existed in the Middle East and North Africa for centuries.”
[….]
Next, the report said that the countries in question had 856,000 Jews before 1948, 76,000 in 1968 and only 4,315 in 2012.
[….]
CIJA chairman David Koschitzky responded to the news, saying, “Today’s decision brings Canada one step closer to recognizing the otherwise forgotten persecution of Jewish minorities across the Middle East.”
He continued, “This is not only a matter of ensuring historical accuracy. Once implemented, it will correct a fundamental imbalance in a Canadian policy that acknowledges Arab refugees, but makes no mention of Jewish refugees resulting from the Arab- Israeli conflict.”
This is very good news! Two weeks ago we told you of the thousands of Somalis deported from Saudi Arabia as it attempts to un-diversify itself, and now it appears they will get a warm welcome in Mogadishu.
Time to rebuild the once beautiful Mogadishu. http://borgenproject.org/mogadishu-sees-rapid-growth-and-development-as-somali-diaspora-returns-home/
Surely our critics think I’m being snarky, but I am not—many of these returning Somalis have gained skills that can now be put to use repairing their country. And, surely al-Shabaab will not have the numbers to defeat the returnees if those returning have a backbone!
Saciid Qorsheel, Minister of Land & Air Transport of the Somali government talked to the press at Mogadishu’s international airport and declared that the government is pleased to support the deportees returning to the country.
The Minister said at the airport that they are ready to prepare tents for the immigrants being sent back from foreign countries so they can have somewhere to seek refuge within their country.
“We will provide full accommodation for the deportees.” Said Saciid Qorsheel, Minister of Land & Air Transport
Recently, Somali immigrants have been deported from many countries and returned to the capital city Mogadishu, especially the ones coming back from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
I’ll be watching for the squawking from the UNHCR which will surely oppose a large return to Somalia because it undercuts their work of continuing to spread Somali “refugees” throughout the west!
Remember back in January the post about Somalis plotting in Indonesia about how to break into Australia, here— just give them a plane ticket to Mogadishu! Put them to work!
Once in awhile the UN does something we can support.
As you read this news account, know that many African refugees in America (and in 30 other countries!) still believe in this brutal practice (adding “vibrant” cultural diversity/enrichment to your community).
HARGEISA, SOMALIA – The 30 Somali teenagers — both boys and girls — all agreed: Female genital mutilation is harmful and the practice should be abandoned. But what they really meant, they revealed moments later, is that girls should still have their genitalia cut — just not sewn shut.
Read ‘Infidel’ for a personal account of the mutilation Somalis believe is required of them under Islamic law.
“It’s our tradition, and if the girls are not subjected to ‘suna’ (cutting) she will not be accepted for marriage,” said Asthma Ibrahim Jabril, 17.
The students, who are part of an after-school club in Somaliland that the U.N. children’s agency helps fund, discuss issues like child labor, early marriage and female genital mutilation in a classroom with several large hearts scrawled along the walls. Somaliland is a semi-autonomous region in northern Somalia that has remained largely peaceful during Somalia’s decades of conflict.
UNICEF is weaving a delicate campaign to educate communities in Somaliland about the harms of female genital mutilation and to get leaders, who are meeting there this month to debate the practice, to denounce it.
Child rights advocates in nearly 30 countries are fighting to reduce the number of girls subjected to the cutting of their genitalia, a practice that goes back thousands of years and that Somali practitioners often link to Islamic requirements.
Egyptian pharaohs blamed, not Islam
Experts try to convince them that this is not a religious practice, but they are having none of it!
Officials with UNICEF tried to underscore that they do not believe female genital mutilation is required by Islam, though it is not strictly practiced by Muslims. Haydar Nasser, a UNICEF official who is Iraqi by birth but now a Canadian citizen, told the leaders that they were following a custom first practiced by the Egyptians some 6,000 years ago, long before Islam was founded.
“So the question to you to discuss today is why as a Muslim practice do you employ a pharaoh practice, pharaohs who went to hell because they are ‘kaffirs,’” he said, using the Arabic word for someone who doesn’t believe in Islam.
Thanks, but no thanks!
At the end of the daylong meeting that UNICEF had hoped would end in a decision to abandon female genital mutilation, the religious leaders — including the minister of religious affairs — say they could not agree to abandon suna. The practice of female genital cutting will continue.
I’m glad to see that the UN is trying, it’s better than turning a blind eye in the name of cultural relativism.
And, the success so far confirms what the Israeli government has been saying all along—the majority of so-called ‘asylum seekers’ are economic migrants who do not have a legitimate claim of asylum, or they would be making it!
African protesters at US Embassy in Tel Aviv in January demanding to be allowed to stay in Israel. https://refugeeresettlementwatch.org/2014/01/07/waiting-for-the-unhcr-to-blast-saudi-arabia-as-they-did-israel-yesterday/
A record 1,705 African asylum seekers left Israel in February, Interior Minister Gideon Sa’ar announced Thursday. He also predicted that the wave of departures would continue in the coming months.
“This figure for the last month surprises me for the better,” Sa’ar said at a conference of Population and Immigration Authority directors in Ashkelon. “If the trend we identify continues, and I’ve been informed that it will continue into March, there will be a departure of enormous proportions from Israel this year. It is most important.”
February’s figure represents about 3% of the estimated number of African asylum seekers in Israel. The monthly figures have grown since November, from 63 to 325 in December and 765 in January.
“We stood up to constant propaganda insinuating there were tens of thousands of asylum seekers, even though you know that a tiny percentage of them submitted asylum requests,” said Sa’ar.“This whole theory collapsed in the last months when it turned out there was a large exodus of those who came for economic reasons and figured that in a day or two he would no longer be able to work and earn money, so we see a definitive change in direction.”
Sa’ar showed the statistics on a placard headlined “Voluntary departure data – illegal infiltrators” to make his point. Each African asylum seeker who leaves Israel through the end of next month is entitled to a $3,500 government grant.
Maybe we could try this in America! The only difference is that the Israelis now have an almost impenetrable border fence, so more are not on the way.
Back to Haaretz:
There was a recent flurry of criticism when it was learned that some of the migrants chose to go to Uganda rather than to their home country. But, leave it to a US refugee resettlement contractor, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society to stick its nose into Israel’s business (see our previous post here).
It remains unclear what, if any, agreement was made with Uganda. The Jewish-American Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society contacted the director of refugee affairs in the Ugandan prime minister’s office, and he responded that he did not know of any arrangement with Israel.
The Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society is one of nine major US resettlement contractors who resettle refugees for the US State Department in your cities and towns. The US taxpayer supplies them with about half of their entire annual budget. Their past CEO collected a salary in excess of $300,000 a year and we can assume their new one does as well. Can it be called do-gooder-itis with a salary like that?
For new readers, we have 147 previous posts in our category ‘Israel and refugees’ here.
Richard Berman stands in front of Hope House. Berman wants to welcome asylum seekers to brain-drained Maine!
He says the City of Portland “gets it,” but the rest of Maine needs to “wake up!”
We’ve learned recently that as many as 70% of asylum claims are fraudulent, then there is the big NYT storyabout the Chinese frauds, and just this morning we learned of a large asylum fraud bust in Maryland, but if Mainers, like Richard Berman, want to lure them to Portland with free housing (welfare) until their claims are processed, Maine can have them if they promise to keep them!
Here is the story from the Bangor Daily News. Hat tip: Joanne. Head honchos from the US State Department were in Maine last week for a PR tour.
PORTLAND, Maine — From home to school to work, the lives of refugees and asylum seekers received closer looks from federal and city officials this week.
On Friday, Feb. 21, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Anne Richard visited Portland Adult Education and several local businesses to see how refugees and resettlement agencies are faring. Richard was accompanied by Lawrence Bartlett, state department director of refugee admissions.
Asylum seekers are not eligible for welfare nationally until their claims are approved, but in Maine, as we mentioned here recently, they do get welfare support and now they get housing thanks to developer/philanthropist/spiritualist Richard Berman.
On Tuesday, Mayor Michael Brennan cut the ribbon at ceremonies marking the opening of Hope House at 14 Sherman St. The apartment house has been home to 13 Africans seeking political asylum for almost six months.
Hope House, which was bought by developer Richard Berman and operated by the nonprofit Hope Acts, solves the most basic question asylum seekers such as Hugues Ingabire, 21, face when they arrive in Portland.
Berman says that Maine doesn’t have enough brains so they need asylum seekers and refugees to make up the shortfall.
Berman said welcoming and getting asylum seekers settled is a benefit to Maine’s future.
“This is the reverse of the brain drain,” he said.
Berman: Wake up Maine!
Publicist Jen Dimond said she wants Brennan and other Hope House visitors to see the success of the collaboration between Berman and Hope Acts because it is understood the city does not have the resources to provide the full measure of help to refugees and asylum seekers.
Berman said city officials are doing what they can, even though there are limits.
“It seems like the city gets it,” he said. ‘It is the state that needs to wake up.”
So who is Richard Berman—the brain behind the plan for Portland?
PORTLAND – Richard Berman is not your typical developer
Over the last 40 years, Berman has gained a reputation as a philanthropist, as well as a developer who values community engagement, “smart growth,” historic preservation and affordable housing.
Berman is drawn to mysticism and meditation.He was born and raised Jewish, before turning to Eastern religions. He now attends St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Cape Elizabeth and serves on the Maine Council of Churches.
“Just because you’re a real estate developer doesn’t mean you’re not spiritual,” Berman quipped.
Next month, the Cape Elizabeth resident will turn 68 years old and steer a new course in his career. Berman says will “semi-retire” so he can turn more of his full-time attention to philanthropic endeavors, without having to worry about profit margins.
“I want to turn my talent and treasures to good use,” Berman said. “I’m turning my attention to more spiritual matters like immigration and homelessness.”
For new readers, we have an extensive archive on Maine, here. Be sure to check out one of our top posts for the last few years (from 2009)—-Maine the welfare magnet—about how the US State Department and Catholic Charities helped start the migrant stampede to Maine.
