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Alan Baker

Amb. Alan Baker is director of the Institute for Contemporary Affairs at the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs.

The accusers ignore the fact that the Israeli public suffer from ongoing and daily acts of terror committed by Palestinian and Islamist fanatics.
The recent spate of violent acts of anti-Semitism in the United States, together with the alarming renaissance of anti-Semitism in Europe and elsewhere, should be seen as a rude wake-up call from the curious and lackadaisical state of hibernation in which the Jewish world seems to have naively ensconced itself.
The Palestinians have undertaken a mode of ceremonially issuing complaints to the International Criminal Court against Israeli leaders and military commanders regarding virtually everything Israel does.
After the U.N. General Assembly voted on June 14 to condemn Israel for its handling of Gaza border-fence violence, it is all the more curious to observe the deliberate disregard of the flagrant international humanitarian, environmental and ecological crimes committed by Hamas and the Palestinians.
The Gaza border clash was not a situation of armed conflict, nor had it anything to do with the laws of armed conflict and occupation of territory. It was routine border protection by a sovereign state, from within its sovereign territory, facing a blatant threat of border violation by violent elements on the other side of the line.
The significance could be to release Israel from its own obligations pursuant to the agreements, including the transfer of funds, granting VIP rights of passage to Palestinian leaders, security cooperation, the transfer of goods and the like.
It is utterly sad that Beinart has chosen to vent his own, personal, seething hatred of Israel. The fact that the editors gave him license to vent this hatred through manipulation and inaccuracy represents a disservice to what Beinart describes as “well-meaning American Jews.”