Editor’s Note: To our readers

The Daily Bruin apologizes for the editorial cartoon that ran on our Opinion page this morning.

As a newspaper, we take responsibility for our mistakes and apologize for them, so that’s what we’re doing here. Running this cartoon was an error that we deeply regret. It is wrong to use religion or religious tenets to criticize political policy. And it’s wrong to perpetuate harmful stereotypes – intentional or otherwise. We strive to understand the community that we cover. So as part of our ongoing education, we are reaching out to local religious leaders to help our staff understand the historical context behind these kinds of hurtful images.

We sincerely apologize to the entire UCLA community and, in particular, any of its members who felt personally hurt, offended or attacked.

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92 Comments

  1. The only letters the Daily Bruin should be releasing are resignation letters from the Editor-in-chief and the staff members who allowed this to be published.

    1. Agreed. This is not an error that should have EVER occurred. Each and every one of the individuals that this tripe passed on the way to it being printed should resign.

      1. Want the name of a cartoonist who’s frequently critical of Israel? Carlos Latuff. Now what? Are you going to pass his name on to Canary Mission and make sure he never works in Hollywood again?

        LOL

        1. Thank you, I thought it was a student not some Brazilian leftist man. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlos_Latuff

          No need for any blacklisting, Latuff is well known as a Jew-hater. He will be dealt with in the next life if not this one.

          Funny, though if he put Jesus in a urine bottle or drew vile anti-Semitic images, he’s safe, but let’s see him draw something nasty about pedophile Mohamed. Then watch what happens.

          1. Youjust said the name of the cartoonist was Carlos Latuff and now you say it is not. Latuff is a jew-hater, just read the Wikipedia article. Mondoweiss is well known as a Jew-hating site along with Veteran’s Today and Daily Stormer.

            From the Wikipedia article:
            Between 2010 and 2011, Tablet magazine published three articles,[42][43][44]
            in which Mondoweiss, along with some other blogs, were thoroughly
            criticized. These articles characterized Weiss as a “Jew-baiter” and
            “intensely anti-Israel”, saying his site is “obsessed with Israel and
            the machinations of the U.S. Israel lobby”, and laden with “sweeping and
            unsubstantiated rhetoric”.

            Weiss responded to allegations in Tablet, by stating that the magazine had “smeared” him and several other bloggers as Jew-baiters.[45]
            Walt questioned the article’s premise by stating that Smith’s article
            contained “not a scintilla of evidence” that “Weiss, or I have written
            or said anything that is remotely anti-Semitic, much less that involves
            ‘Jew-baiting’. There’s an obvious reason for this omission: None of us
            has ever written or said anything that supports Smith’s outrageous
            charges.”[46]

            In 2012, The Algemeiner Journal characterized Mondoweiss as “Purveyors of Anti-Semitic Material”.[47] Also, Armin Rosen, a Media Fellow with The Atlantic, criticized Peter Beinart’s blog, Open Zion (which appears in The Daily Beast) for publishing an article by Alex Kane because he is Mondoweiss’s “Staff Reporter”. Rosen wrote that “Mondoweiss often gives the appearance of an anti-Semitic enterprise.”[48]

            Robert Wright, a Senior Editor at The Atlantic,
            responded to Rosen’s article, writing “This tarring of Kane by virtue
            of his association with Mondoweiss would be lamentable even if Rosen
            produced a convincing indictment of Mondoweiss, showing that it indeed
            evinces anti-Semitism.”[49] James Fallows, a national correspondent for The Atlantic concurred with Wright’s response to Rosen.[50] Alex Kane, Adam Horowitz, and Philip Weiss responded in Mondoweiss arguing that Rosen’s article, “is about nothing more than policing the discourse on Israel”.[51]

            Later that year, The Algemeiner Journal published another article decrying Mondoweiss for its associations with Judith Butler, in light of her recent comments describing Islamist movements, even those of the militant variety, like Hamas and Hezbollah, as “social movements that are progressive, that are on the Left, that are part of a global Left”.[52]

            In 2013, Peter Beinart, writing for The Daily Beast,
            accused Mondoweiss of “ignoring human rights abuse unless it can be
            linked to America or capitalism or the West”, and said that “By
            admitting that they’re more interested in human rights violations when
            Israel commits them than when Hamas does, Horowitz and Roth are implying
            that they don’t really see human rights as universal”.[53] Later in the year Commentary magazine accused Mondoweiss of being complicit in an “effort to delegitimize Jewish rights”.[54]

            Journalist Bradley Burston, writing for Haaretz, described Mondoweiss as “avowedly anti-Israel” in reference to its coverage of the 2014 kidnapping and murder of Israeli teenagers.[55] Haaretz itself has described Mondoweiss as a “progressive Jewish website”.[56]

            In 2015, David Bernstein, writing for The Washington Post,
            called the website a “hate site”, and listed quotes from Weiss that he
            asserted were anti-Semitic. This included Weiss’ claim that “the Israel
            lobby … reflected a contract the American establishment had made with
            Jews to drive the economy in the 1970s”,[57] which Bernstein likened to a belief in an “Elders of Zion type group”.

            According to Elliot Kaufman, the Vice President of Cardinal for Israel, a Stanford University group, writing in The Stanford Review,
            Mondoweiss “often publishes astonishingly anti-Semitic material, using
            classic anti-Semitic imagery such as depicting Jews as spiders,
            cockroaches, or octopuses with tentacles controlling others, and
            Holocaust inversion. Its hatred of Israel is as deep as it is vicious.”[58]

          2. “You just said the name of the cartoonist was Carlos Latuff and now…” actually, I never did say that. Learn to read. Maybe then the address of your “law office” won’t be a PO box in a Yorba Linda UPS office, FFS.

  2. You still don’t get it. This wasn’t just about perpetuating harmful, stereotypes. It was — say it with me now since you obviously refuse to — blantantly anti-Semitic as an attempt to control the Jewish narrative, drive a wedge between Jews, suggest that Jews cannot be religiously adherent and support the government of Israel, determine for a minority what is acceptable according to their religion, strip Jews of the power to make decisions for themselves regarding the difference between religion and secularism in Israeli policy formation, and drag the Jewish religion into a policy where it was never discussed or used as a motive for it. So, no, this isn’t just about perpetuating stereotypes. The cartoon is blatantly racist through its discretionary, discriminatory singling out of a minority and forcing them to defend their religion regarding a government’s secular policy decision. The fact that you refused to use the terms, “anti-Semitism,” or “anti-Semitic” and to apologize directly to the Jewish community is insulting, and shows that you have yet to personalize the injury upon its victims, and really don’t get the concept of restorative justice.

    1. I’m Jewish, I like Israel–and I don’t buy what you’re saying. I don’t find the cartoon antisemetic. Outrage culture.

      1. Would you find a cartoon of terrorists standing next to a Quran and using it to justify their actions offensive? It seems liberals have an unmatched sensitivity for anything that equates Islam with terrorism or extremism, but are completely blind to the fact that using the old testament to justify Israel’s actions is the same thing.

        1. The cartoonist’s point, obviously, was not to say Netanyahu is using Jewish scriptures to justify his racism (though he does that too), as you analogize. It was to say that he is violating the highest moral precepts of Judaism. A lot of us Jews agree with that.
          Should the cartoonist and editors have anticipated the hysterical reaction and the way the message would be utterly distorted by those who insist that any criticism of Israeli policy is anti-Semitic? Maybe. But in fact, this reaction, to attack the messenger, only demonstrates how indefensible those policies are.

    2. What criticism of Israel is not “anti-semitic”? Or is all criticism thus? Is criticism of German policies and practices inherently racist and anti-German?

      We know very well that anti-semitism is not the issue: It is an all purpose shield used to keep the American public in particular, in the dark and mystified about what Israel is really all about…conquest of other peoples land and the looting of their patrimony in the name of a disgraceful racist ideology parading as democratic self-determination.

      The upstanding students who cry “anti-semitism” whenever their tribal beliefs and customs are challenged, do not wish to debate the issue of Palestine. They refuse such debates now because they cannot win through rational deliberation. But should they be trapped into debate, they need only to whisper into the microphone “anti-semitism” and the audience shudders in fear. But the complainers prefer to stifle free discussion rather than use the “A” word in polite debate. And they are effective generally. A large number of states have already, or are proposing, legislation aimed at stripping away the right of Americans to free speech, the very heart of democracy, at the behest of a foreign state. Apparently, these legislators would rather shred the Constitution than face the wrath of a handful of Zionists come the next election cycle. But, Zionists and Israelis actually frame, and even write, the legislation required and state assemblies across this “land of the free” snap to attention. Why are they so willing to disregard the Constitution? You can figure this out, can’t you?

      The Bruin does not owe anyone an apology as the cartoon is political and not ethnically framed. The Zionists are very effective, however, in using the words “Jew”, “Jewish” and “Judaism” ambiguously between discussion and even morphing inside an on-going debate, just as it suits them in a particular setting. Sometimes “freedom of religion” (Judaism) can carry the day. More often “Jewish” as a political nationality is effective by allowing the claim of “self-determination” such as Israel has denied others. religions don’t claim “self-determination.” The ethnic use of the term “Jewish” is used to stimulate support for a people victimized all the time and everywhere. Zionists mystify rational discussion by shifting these meanings around. Even this fanciful disregard for language and clear meaning is itself characteristic of criminals and sociopaths! The amazing thing is that this permanent ambiguity, just like permanent unstated borders, has dazzled others for decades: Seventy years on and Zionists are still getting away with murder, theft, pillage, imprisoning children, and dropping illegal munitions, cluster bombs, phosphorus bombs and uranium payloads on civilians. Then, the criminals who actually do this, who give the orders, tout themselves as the “most moral army in the world” and charge the victims of their crimes with “terrorism” for defending their homes and property, that is, they made me do it, another sign of social pathology, blaming the victim Get it?

      Withdraw your apology, respect yourselves and continue to exercise your right to investigate and report and sponsor open discussion. Chiding or ridiculing leaders is standard fare in politics and that is the essence of the troubling cartoon, not “religion.” You owe nobody an apology. The complainers are only attempting to shutdown your freedom of speech at every turn. Anti-semitism? It “hurts the feelings” of some students to hear someone say that Israel is a criminal state…these hurt “feelings” must have a source, a cause. Alas! It is “anti-semitism” that hurts these feelings and anti-semitism has no right to free speech, and the perpetrator is constrained until such time as the poor wounded students recover. If racism is to blame for hurt feelings, what is the cause of the murder of 531 children in Gaza two years ago? That would have to be something like “Super Racism.” Hurt feelings and “insecurity” are not evidence of racism, but rather of neurosis. There is no Constitutional requirement that the exercise of free speech be comforting or sedative. If such feelings, such feigned subjective feelings can provide evidence of racism, well then …my tukas!

      1. Thank you for making yourself the prime example of why this cartoon is anti semitic and why an apology needed to be issued. Your three paragraph rant on Israel demonstrates just how blind to to morality your hatred has left you. The cartoon is offensive because it portrays Israel as justifying it’s actions using the Jewish religion. Would you be defending the Bruin if they published cartoons of Mohammed? Would it be acceptable if they had a cartoon that had terrorists justifying their actions with Quranic verses? Since you are so closed minded that you can’t see why this cartoon is offensive let me spell it out for you. The issue is not that Israel was criticized, the issue is that Judiasm is being used to justify Israeli actions.

        1. Israel justifies its actions using the Jewish religion all the time! The settler’s constant refrain is “God gave this land to us.” A land deed, from their big book of bronze age fairy tales. That’s part of Judaism, right? Being used to justify Israeli actions?

          1. Judaism can be just as violent as any other religion. Or are you going to pretend you’ve never heard of The King’s Torah? The Torat Hamelech that gives God’s okay to kill gentile babies if it’s suspected they might one day grow up to be enemies of Jews? I heard rabbis in the IDF were passing those out to soldiers in Operation Protective Pillar. Maybe that’s why the IDF managed to kill 500 Palestinian children in Gaza.

            And the “whole controversy” is that millions of Palestinians have been living under a belligerent, illegal military occupation for over 50 years. That’s the “whole controversy.”

      2. Watch how I can prove your hypocrisy. Did you make any statement condemning your fellow UC students for rioting and preventing Milo from speaking? Were you defending his right to free speech? Would you defend the Daily Bruin if they published Mohammed cartoons? Or is your free speech argument selectively applied to things you agree with?

      3. Your description of Israel only confirms that it is people such as you who are in the dark about “what Israel is really all about” though in your case, ignorance is self-imposed. Along the way you have also proved you know nothing at all about Jews (including their social and kin connections and their historical connection to the land of Israel), or about Judaism generally.
        I suppose you believe you are clever in trying to turn the charge of anti-semitism into some sort of shield. It’s hardly original, has been discredited and has a name: the “Livingstone formulation.” What other put-upon minority would you dare tell was falsely charging “racism” or “Islamophobia” or the like to avoid criticism? We all know the answer is none – so the question for you is, why the obsession with Jews, other than they are a very safe group to attack. You don’t need to worry about your safety or anything while you spew your bile. The only reaction you elicit is one of pity with a tinge of embarrassment for your parents who must be so disappointed with the unhinged virtue signaler they raised.

    3. Your post sounds so deranged.

      1. “Perpetuating harmful stereotypes” – which stereotypes would those be?

      2. “blatantly anti-Semitic” – not at all. But there are plenty of Jews that feel conflating an apartheid, Jim Crow country with all Jews in general is anti-Semitic.

      3. “control the Jewish narrative,” what does that even mean? There are many different “Jewish narratives,” I’m sure, and I’ll bet some of them you wouldn’t approve of at all. But who died and made you king?

      4. “drive a wedge between Jews,” sorry SUFJ but that ship sailed a long time ago. Compare AIPAC positions to JStreet or even Jewish Voice For Peace. There’s vigorous debate about Israel within the Jewish community, and plenty of contention. There should be. Jews of conscience are increasingly appalled by Israel’s rightward lurch into fascism.

      5. “strip Jews of the power to make decisions for themselves regarding the
      difference between religion and secularism in Israeli policy formation” This might be the most hysterical portion of your post. How could a cartoon “strip Jews of the power.. etc?” What I think your comment really is code for, is “Israel is off limits for criticism, especially by Goys.” I’m assuming the cartoonist is not Jewish, but what if he is? What then?

      6. “drag Jewish religion into a policy,” Are you nuts? The settlers’ entire justification for taking over the WB is religious – i.e. “God gave it to me!”

      7. “The cartoon is blatantly racist through its discretionary, discriminatory singling out of a minority…” The cartoon has a topic, a specific topic, like any good cartoon. How many subjects do you think it should cover? 5 or 6? 8 or 12? And anyway, Jews aren’t a minority in Israel.

      8. “apologize to the Jewish community,” you know, there are plenty of Jews that applaud this cartoon, Jews that are critical of Israel and Jews that care deeply about the rights of all people, in particular the rights of Palestinians, and not just the welfare of their own tribe at everyone else’s expense. They require no apology.

  3. Does the artist realize he’s a privileged European living in a state formed when white protestants went to war against Mexico? He seems jubilant (judging by his FB) to live in a country started and conquered by Christian Whites, why the hypocrisy?

  4. The Daily Bruin should cover this important story by investigating what happened and how this despicable cartoon was ever published. It is an important topic and you should shine some light on who was behind it and how it was published, especially with some of the other recent anti-Israeli and anti-Jewish controversies that have occurred recently at UCLA (e.g. Milan Chatterjee, Rachel Beyda, etc…).

  5. Good job UCLA of both slandering Judaism, and also *lying* about Israeli policy entirely. There are over 20 ethnically clean Muslim-only apartheid states in Arabia precisely because Islam fully justifies the theft of land from Christians and Jews, while evicting and/or killing members of those two religions.

    Israel has no such policy and resides on a small sliver of land that belongs to the Jewish homeland, whose legal foundations go back nearly 100 years.

    Make no mistake, lying about Jews and Israeli policy is neither brave nor new. Standing up for what is right, as the staunch Zionist MLK did, could get you a dirtnap though.

    1. The legal foundations of the Jewish homeland goes back to the time of Abraham, when God promised the land to his descendants. A little more than “100 years” ago I think!

      And it was Arabs from surrounding countries who stole Israel’s land, killing or driving out the Jews who were there. They now call themselves “Palestinians” and claim “Squatter’s rights”, and their leaders even have the nerve to claim that Israel is stealing THEIR land!!!

      1. The “nearly 100 years” reference was, I think, meant to refer to the Balfour Declaration (whose centennial is this November) whose terms were then made part of international law through the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine of 1922. Issues proving the indigeneity of the Jewish people to the land, of course, stretch back millenia as established, among many other things, through archaeology and ancient writers (both Jewish and non-Jewish).
        Perhaps the Daily Bruin might want to run an article on the phenomenon of Temple Denial – perhaps the insult to the Christian community (since the Muslims now claim that the Temple was never in Jerusalem, they are also asserting that the Gospel narrative of Jesus and the moneychangers is a lie, a Zionist plot perhaps?) might help place the Arab anti-Israel/Jewish narrative in a new and more accurate light.

  6. How could you be so stupid to begin with? Whoever approved this must resign. My son is an alumnus of UCLA and I am an alumna of UCB. Neither college will see one bloody dime from me. Ever.

    1. That’s the most effective response, Deborah. I’ve done the same with my alma mater. I sent yearly contributions for decades, and stopped about 8 years ago. No more. Not ever. Not a dime. Not until they show they are practicing political diversity on campus in their history, English, sociology, and political science departments.

      I asked three times for a survey of the political affiliations of the professors in those departments. They not only wouldn’t do it, they wouldn’t even acknowledge receipt of my request. Case closed.

    2. This is a good start. The next step would be to write your congressman or congresswoman to ask for this university not to receive any federal funding. Actually given the history of antisemitic events at Berkeley and Irvine, and the lack of reaction from the administration, it should probably be the whole UC system that should be banned from any federal funding.

    3. The taxpayers of California want universities that honor and respect the Constitution, not thought police spitting out figurative duct tape. If you want to defend Israel’s settlement policy or its refusal to allow exiled Palestinians to visit, let alone live, in their homeland, then go to the mat for that but don’t try to shut down debate by hurling cheap anti-Semitism shots at anyone who criticizes the Israeli government. As they say, name-calling, which is what you are doing here, is the weakest form of argument. You may shut some one up temporarily or compel newspaper editors and vice-chancellors to issue unnecessary apologies, but ultimately people resent the imposition of censorship, be it explicit or implicit, and the truth will prevail.

  7. The Daily Bruin should have fired the Editor-in-Chief for such an insulting, anti-semitic cartoon. I am disgusted by this newspaper….it is loosing credibility. What kind of editor and illustrator would publish such anti-semitic nonsence. The editor must be fired

  8. If Jew-haters at UCLA believe Israel should give land “back” to the Palestinians, then they themselves can show their sincerity by marching and demonstrating to give UCLA’s land back to the Native Americans that used to inhabit the land where the school is now.

    That would be the descendants of the “Tongva” tribe that inhabited the LA area long before Europeans stole it from the Tongva and then each other, over and over, back and forth, finally ending up in American hands.

    See for example – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tongva

    And if those Jew-haters really believe the land belongs to its original inhabitants, then they’re backing the wrong side. Jews have lived continuously in Israel, including Judea and Samaria, for over 3500 years. That’s about the same time in history that the Tongva inhabited today’s “safe spaces” on the UCLA campus.

    So … both the Tongva and Jews have a 3500+ year-old claim to their respective lands. How far back does the UCLA Bruin claim go? Hypocrites …

    If the Jew-haters want written proof of the Jewish claim to their land, they can read about it in a book called “The Bible”. If they don’t like to read, the same story is available in movie form.

  9. Too little, too late. There is a reason why UCLA has a reputation, along with sister campuses, of antisemitism, and this is just another illustration of the problem.

  10. Other than publishing this rather generic “apology,” what actions will the Board be taking to prove that it is in fact taking responsibility for publishing this cartoon? Will there be anything substantive or, since this cartoon defames Jews only, is the case now considered closed? I can only hope that the latter question turns out not to be a rhetorical one.
    Because it has become common to justify violence against Jews worldwide by pointing to some (often mischaracterized) Israeli policy, one would think the Board would be particularly vigilant when it deals with such cartoons. Time will tell.

    1. I guess the New York Times must have been mistaken when it reported the Israeli government passed a law to retroactively legalize the bulldozing of Palestinian homes to establish settlements on privately held Palestinian land. Please write the NYT’s editor then and demand publication of your revisionist history. You may then be ripe for a job in the Trump administration, where you can establish your Ministry of Truth. War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Good luck.

  11. At what point, at what level and at what AGE do we teach that a simple “sorry, my bad” doesn’t retroactively clear the slate? It seems dubious that no one at the DB knew there would be some reaction from this (as well as some adolescent self-congratulations about their Charlie Hebdo bravery). The DB – and the UCLA campus, as well as the UC system – should watch Triumph Of The Will if they want to see how cute these cartoons are. While they’re “reaching out to religious leaders” – a non-promise if there ever was one – they should invite a few Holocaust survivors in as well, while there are any left.

  12. Someone should submit a cartoon depicting the Palestinians making up historical facts. Nothing religious, nothing ad hominem, just something that honestly reflects the other side of the debate. Let’s see how the editorial board reacts to that.

  13. Sometimes, I am really ashamed to have graduated from UCLA. It appears, nowadays, people there no longer see a problem with racism itself, or possibly see it at all, but instead conflate the concept with simple disparaging speech against certain, specific, locally marginalized groups. Some people there need to take a step back and understand the root of this problem: the ideology itself. The fact that this could pass through several editorial eyes and still be approved call into question the intellectual integrity of the whole Daily Bruin.

  14. I wonder just when Mr Abejon left the SJP. Could it be just before SJP issued its statement to the DB?

    Let’s be clear. The record of the SJP across the nation-and at UCLA makes it clear that they are anti-Semitic. They were created by anti-Semites and have acted in an anti-Semitic nature ever since they were created. The fact that they admit misfit and misguided members of Jewish background does not make it any less so.

    I applaud the DB for making the apology, but the current staff of this paper need to do some self-reflection. The university itself needs to engage in some self reflection. Only in a climate of political correctness and left-wing ideology could anti-Semitic cartoons appear in a campus paper. You would not have made this mistake with a cartoon that cut to the heart of Muslim. black, Asian or Latino students. This is just the latest in a long series of ugly incidents that have infected university campuses as a result of the campus politicization of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. UCLA and all universities need to understand how this has led to a climate of tension and fear for so many Jewish students.

  15. “Israel” was not founded by peaceful immigrants seeking refuge & escape from the Pogroms of Europe; it was founded by angry, racist terrorists committed to ethnically cleanse Palestine from its native inhabitants by all means preferably by terroristic means & cold blooded murder. That philosophy of the past continues today.

    Human beings will call out the fact this ‘miracle’ created the world’s largest/longest suffering refugee population we have today and the land grab under the barrel of a gun just has not stopped 69 yrs on.

    1. Congratulations on projecting the mentality behind the 7th century Arab imperial conquest of the Holy Land onto the descendants of the indigenous Jewish population who have managed to re-establish their independence in a portion of their ancestral lands. If any group sought the ethnic cleansing of the other, it is the Arabs of the Jews. They succeeded once so far: in 1948, the Jordanians and Egyptians killed or expelled every Jew who had lived in the Mandate lands their armies seized and illegally occupied from 1949-67.
      If Israel were actually intent on ethnically cleansing the Palestinian Arabs, don’t you think the goal would have been reached long ago? Or can you tell us what Israel has been waiting for to begin the process?
      Who precisely do you think you are fooling, and doesn’t it bother you that the underpinnings of your political position are transparent and demonstrable falsehoods?

      1. The Ashkenazi at confirmed DNA of 99.9% European and 0% ME is totally of European ancestry. Yes or no?

      2. Charlie in NY, you elide one important detail: the European Ashkenazi invasion of Palestine! These European Jews invaded Palestine and drove over 700,000 Palestinians from their homes. Those who resisted were killed. That’s what started the hostilities. Prior, Jews and Arabs got along fine.

        “If Israel were intent on ethnically cleansing the Palestinian lands…” They can’t do it all at once genius, it has to be bit by bit, and frame the Palestinians as the instigators. Otherwise Israel would be even a bigger global pariah than it already is.

        1. First of all, there was no “European Ashkenazi invasion of Palestine!” The truth of the matter is in the late 19th century and early 20th century Zionists from Europe, Russia and elsewhere fled persecution and violence and sought refuge in their ancestral homeland in what was then Ottoman and British controlled Palestine. They were refugees who joined other Jews, Christians and Muslims. There was no country, state or independent entity. There never was. Unfortunately, the Arabs didn’t like the Jewish refugees and attacked them violently, including riots in 1929 that killed hundreds of Jewish men, women and children. What’s more, 700,000 Arabs (they didn’t call themselves Palestinians back then) were not driven out of their homes. Rather, when the UN partitioned the land to create Jewish and Arab states, several Arab countries started a war. That war created a number of refugees, including about 400,000 Arabs who fled or were forced from what became Israel AND hundreds of thousands of Jews who fled or were forced from Arab countries following the creation of the state of Israel.
          Facts matter and you clearly don’t know actual facts or are living in denial of them.

          1. Oh I see. You’re a “Nakba denier.” That’s about as contemptible as a “Holocaust denier,” and just as racist. Sorry, but information about the Nakba is available to anyone with fingers to Google it. And it was over 700,000 Palestinians that were forced from their homes by Jewish terrorists, not 400,000 and that information is also well documented. You could start with Wikipedia. And your claim that European Jews emigrated to Palestine to flee persecution in the 19th century is untrue. At the turn of the century the only significant Jewish population (10%) in Palestine was Sephardic, Jews that spoke Arabic, dressed like Arabs and lived peacefully with them. It wasn’t until 1917 that European Jews arrived in Palestine in droves because the Balfour Declaration made clear the British intention to create a Jewish state within Palestine. European Ashkenazi Jews then tripled the Jewish population, though they were hostile to the Sephardim and other local Muslim and Christian Palestinians. The 1929 Hebron riots weren’t about Arabs attacking “Jewish refugees,” as you claim, but Arabs provoked to attack by hostile Ashkenazi emigres claiming that Palestine would soon be all theirs, and “The wall is ours!” This provocation, combined with the Balfour Declaration, led to the Hebron riots. This too is well documented.

            Gee, I guess the Arab states didn’t appreciate England giving away a chunk of land it didn’t own to a bunch of European Jews and killing and kicking out the indigenous population. Can you blame them? As for the Sephardic Jews that came from other Arab nations to Israel, some were expelled by countries angry about the creation of Israel, and just as many of them came willingly — after all, the new Ashkenazi rulers were handing out free land and houses to Jews. But to claim they were all driven out is a lie. And to elide the reason why some of them were driven out is disingenuous.

            Your claim that Palestine wasn’t a sovereign country is irrelevant; the 700,000 Palestinian Arabs that were either killed or driven off their lands were descendants of people who lived in those lands and farmed them for thousands of years. They were citizens and landowners, until Israel made them stateless refugees.

            “Facts matter and you clearly don’t know actual facts or are living in denial of them.” Right.

          2. 1) Comparing the Nakba to the Holocaust is not only factually incorrect it is ridiculous and offensive. You are comparing hundreds of thousands of refugees from a defensive war started by several Arab countries, including Jordan, Egypt and Syria in attempt to destroy the new Jewish State of Israel and “throw the Jews into the Sea,”to the intentional and industrialized murder of more than 6,000,000 innocent civilians by the Nazis and their “Final Solution”. Speaking of refugees, Israel was created by Jewish refugees from around the world including many Arab countries.
            3) Jews started to return to their Ancestral homeland in what is now Israel in the late 1900s to flee constant persecution and violence. There is ample history of how Jews were treated, from pograms in Russia and Eastern Europe, to the Spanish Inquisition to relentless attacks during the Crusades. Early Zionists started buying land in Ottoman controlled Palestine prior to 1917, but the number of Jewish refugees increased dramatically following WWI due to several factors, including the growth of the Zionist movement, th Balfour declaration, the rise of anti-Semitism leading to the Nazis and WWII . They weren’t just European.
            4) The 1929 Arab riots were based a false rumor, one that you repeated above, that the Jews were going to destroy the Al Aqsa and rebuild the Temple, among other things. What you call a “provocation” is no excuse to murder hundreds of innocent Jewish men, women and children in cold blood.
            5) England didn’t give away “a chunk of land it didn’t own to a bunch of European Jews” or kill and kick out the indigenous population. The truth of the matter is the UN partitioned the land between Jews and Arabs. The British controlled the land which they acquired from the Ottomans following WWI. The Ottomans controlled it for more than 500 years prior to that. It was NEVER an independent state, country or territory controlled by “Palestinians.” That’s just an incontrovertible fact.
            6) The issue of who controlled the land is absolutely relevant especially since you claim that it was stolen. There is no evidence to support that Arabs are “indigenous” to the land or that they farmed it for thousands of years. Indeed, in addition to the fact that there was very little farming on the land prior to the 20th century, the land throughout history was controlled by many different peoples including Canaanites, Israelites, Babylonians, Persians, Romans, Greeks, Hasmoneans, Byzantine, Mamluks, Muslims, Crusaders, Ottoman, etc… Claiming that it was “Arab” land is completely factually incorrect and completely ignores the complex history of the area.
            As I said earlier and will say again: FACTS MATTER!

          3. “The 1929 Arab riots were based on a false rumor…”

            Well, let’s see, they were based in part on the Balfour Declaration, which was no rumor, and they were based on a bunch of Ashkenazi Jews hoisting their own flag and taunting the Arabs “The Wall is ours!” That’s not a false rumor either, it’s a documented fact – the Ashkenazi were telling the indigenous Palestinian people they were going to take over their lands – which is exactly what happened. So STOP LYING!

            Do I think the Arabs should have rioted and killed Ashkenazi? No of course not. But its dishomest to hide the context that started the riots, and it all began with the Balfour Declaration. Don’t forget also, that many Jews that day survived because friendly Palestinian families hid them in their own homes.

            I wrote you a much longer response earlier today, but I see the Daily Bruin has chosen to censor it.

          4. The indigenous Palestinians? Exactly when did they start calling themselves that term? Weren’t they known as Arabs back then? Talk about LYING. And the rumors that started the violent riots in 1929 was absolutely based a lie because the Jewish refugees were not planning on destroying Al Aqsa. Just like the Israeli government is not planning on doing so today despite continuing rumors.

            Even if you are right about someone saying that the Jews were going to take their lands, which you are not, it is absolutely no defense for the murder of hundreds of men, women and children. Or are you saying that the murders were justified because someone said something that the refugees purportedly wanted to do? Would you defend the same type of actions if there was a rumor in the United States that Muslim immigrants want to take over the United States and implement sharia law? Should “indigenous” Americans be justified to go on a rampage and start murdering Muslims?

          5. You sound insane. If some foreign country invaded America, took over Maine, say, and then declared the residents of Maine now had to live under the martial law of Israel, except for any Jewish settlers in Maine who would have full civil rights, don’t you think Americans would rebel?

            Yes they would. Americans would never put up with that nonsense.That’s not how we do things in the US of A!

            “The indigenous Palestinians,” that’s exactly what they were. Sorry!

          6. Your analogy doesn’t work because Maine is a state with defined borders, a government, etc… Palestine did not. It never did. And there were Jews and Christians living there too. It was not an Arab land like you seem to think it was. It was partitioned by the UN in 1948 to provide states for both Arabs and Jews. It was not stolen from anyone! What’s more, the Jewish refugees who founded Israel were not “some foreign country that invaded” as you falsely contend. They were REFUGEES fleeing persecution, violence and genocide.

            As for analogies, here’s one that is a lot more on point given what is going on in the United States. What if thousands “indigenous” Americans violently attacked and slaughtered Muslim refugees who are fleeing wars and oppression in the Middle East simply because someone said “they wanted to take over?” Would you defend that? Of course you wouldn’t because it would be shameful. Yet you do precisely the same thing when defending the murder of Jewish refugees in British Palestine. And if those Muslims refuges were violently attacked, again and again, maybe they would rise up, defend themselves, and do whatever they could to find sanctuary. Perhaps by even establishing their own state where none previously existed.

            Finally, there is no need for name calling. I am not insane. You might just be confused because you have never been told the truth about what really happened to the Jewish refugees who fled persecution, violence and genocide in order to re-establish a Jewish homeland in Israel.

          7. Idiot. The Arabs did not own Palestine in 1917, the Turks did and had for hundreds of years. The Arabs rejected the Partition Plan of 1947 and chose to start a war of genocide against the Jews. They are quite fortunate some Arabs were allowed to remain and others fled versus being outright killed. The Arabs in general and the Palestinians in specific have caused all of their own misery.

            Most of the Arabs living in Palestine in 1917 were also migrants from neighboring lands. Most of the land was owned by the Turks and rented to tenants.

            Jews never lived “in peace” with Muslims before there was Israel. They lived as best as second class citizens subject to occasional pogroms.

          8. Jeffrey Wilens, David Ben-Gurion, the First Prime Minister of Israel, would disagree with you:

            “If I were an Arab leader, I would never sign an agreement with Israel. It is normal; we have taken their country. It is true God promised it to us, but how could that interest them? Our God is not theirs. There has been anti-Semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They see but one thing: we have come and we have stolen their country. Why would they accept that? – David Ben-Gurion

            The founding fathers of Israel recognize the terrible injustice done to Palestinians, but you don’t. I think they would know more about it than you.

          9. This Ben Gurion quote is not proven. It is found in a book 25 years later by someone purporting to quote him. In any event, he was simply playing devil’s advocate and explaining from the Arab’s perspective what they thought, NOT that they were incorrect. There was no “injustice” to the Palestinians. Jew-hatred and greed (the belief that Muslim land is forever Muslim) resulted in loss of land or exile for some Arabs. Nice try.

          10. *haha* I see you just looked up the quote on Quora and now you’re quoting some random guy named “Joshua Kaplan” as an expert. Too funny!

            You’re probably one of those guys that spins every quote that makes Israel look bad. Like when Netanyahu said “The Arabs are coming out in droves (to vote)!” That wasn’t racist at all, right?

          11. Idiot. The Arabs did not own the land the Brits “gave away.” It belonged to Turkey for hundreds of years. The Brits carved out Arabs states out of virtually all of that land less a tiny Jewish state. But even a Jewish city-state would have been too much for the Arabs, because they are imperialists of the finest order and conquered many native peoples. In 1948 there should have been complete population transfer with Arabs leaving Palestine west of the Jordan and Palestine east of the Jordan becoming the Palestinian state. It’s going to take a long time, but that is how it will eventually end up anyway with one exception. There will be many Arabs still living in Israel and no Jews in Palestine/Jordan.

            No who is the racist here?

          12. The Palestinians fled in fear in ’47 and ’48 because terrorists bent on establishing an ethnically-based state burned down their villages. I imagine if someone burned down my community, I’d also be afraid and take refuge somewhere else — not for good but until the hostilities subsided. I would mourn the loss forever if I were not allowed — just as the exiled Palestinians are not allowed — to return to my homeland.

          13. The violence did not begin in ’47 and ’48. Arabs started killing and trying to force out Jewish refugees in the 1920’s. And surely you must know how the Jordanian army ethnically cleansed Jews from the West Bank. They also destroyed many synagogues while they were at it. Context and facts matter.

      1. Blake knows exactly who he’s talking about: the Ashkenzai European Jewish settlers that forced 700,000 Palestinians out of their homes and farms and massacred anyone who resisted. You really know nothing about Jewish history, do you? You could start with the founding fathers of Israel. Here’s a quote from Moshe Dayan:

        Let us not today fling accusation at the murderers. What cause have we
        to complain about their fierce hatred to us? For eight years now, they
        sit in their refugee camps in Gaza, and before their eyes we turn into
        our homestead the land and villages in which they and their forefathers
        have lived.

        We should demand his blood not from the Arabs of Gaza but from
        ourselves. . . . Let us make our reckoning today. We are a generation of
        settlers, and without the steel helmet and gun barrel, we shall not be
        able to plant a tree or build a house. . . . Let us not be afraid to see
        the hatred that accompanies and consumes the lives of hundreds of
        thousands of Arabs who sit all around us and wait for the moment when
        their hands will be able to reach our blood. – Moshe Dayan

        “We turn into our homestead the land and villages in which they and their forefathers lived.” The formation of Israel involved plenty of ‘killing and raping’ too, btw. Dayan didn’t blame the Palestinians for hating Jewish settlers. He was clear-eyed about the role he played in creating their misery. So why do you?

      2. I dont think I am the confused one. You must be confused thinking you are from the arabian peninsula and you have more rights to Palestine than the Canaanites who went to Palestine 2000 yrs before you supposedly did the same but thanks for wasting my time.

        1. Dummy, the Canaanites no longer exist and have no for 2,000 years. The Arabs came from Arabia. Palestine was very lightly populated in the 19th century until the Jews started immigrating in significant numbers and buying land from the Turks. Many Arabs also came as the land was developed and a local economy built up by the Jews. Thank you.

          It still remains true that Arab Muslims were a imperialistic totalitarian culture. They are deeply offended that non-Arabs, non-Muslims control any part of their “empire.” Why leftist and liberals side with them defies all logic.

          1. Right, because apparently God told the Jews to slaughter all the Canaanites! Peaceful Jews genocided the Canaanites, according to the bible. Maybe they killed them with kindness! That must have been a lapse, as Jeffrey Wilens claims Judaism is not violent.

          2. It’s not. No evidence of any massacre of Canaanites. Or else the Bible would not relate how the Israelites were constantly tempted by Canaanite culture. Anyway that was 2,000 years ago. In modern times, there is no question that more terrorism and war is committed in the name of Islam than all other religions combined.

          3. Give your home back to the Indians. Nothing justifies America at the expense of the native americans…nothing. Oh, the Arabs can also give back all the land they conquered in the 7th century. Nothing justifies the Islamic Empire at the expense of the people who were living there…nothing.

            I hope “Blake” is not a UCLA student whose education is being paid for by the taxpayers. We are not getting our money worth.

          4. At least here in America we don’t disenfranchise people based on their ethnicity or religion. You can’t say that about Israel.

          5. When a group of people start a war and try to destroy them and “throw them into the sea” you can expect people to fight back. Get your history straight. The Arabs should have accepted the UN partition in 1948 instead of starting and losing a number of wars.

          6. Your Jewish sense of entitlement is almost obscene. Somehow you think Jews have a right to ethnically cleanse 700,000 people out of their homes and farms, killing thousands, in the process, and their victims are supposed to be fine about it?

            Arab states were supposed to be happy about a bunch of Europeans giving away Arab land to other Europeans, as if they had any right to?

            “Israel” should have been created in Germany if it had to be created at all. That would at least have made a little more sense.

          7. You are a hypocrite. We have a country the USA only because of ethnic cleansing of the less developed cultures that were here. The Arabs claim the land by right of invasion. So they can lose it, by right of invasion as well. I’m not saying there was any invasion of Jews but from the Arab perspective it would be fair.

          8. Native Americans have all the rights and privileges of any other American citizen. They can vote in US elections.

            That’s not the case for Palestinians.

            “The Arabs claim the land by right of invasion.” I don’t know what you mean by that. The Arab Palestinians that lived in Palestine owned their lands and properties. They had either bought them from someone else or inherited them. Those houses and farms belonged to them, and when they were thrown out of their properties, not only were they not compensated for their losses, but they were turned into stateless refugees. The really old ones still wear the keys to their homes on chains around their necks.

            https://www.pinterest.com/noatsoran/key-in-palestine-art/

          9. Native Americans were only given the right to vote after they had been wiped out. Are you suggesting Israel should kill or exile 99% of the Arabs in Israel including the West Bank and Gaza and then give the remainder the right to vote and some casino rights?

            The Arabs invaded Palestine in the 7th Century. By the 19th century, Palestine was a Turkish province and sparsely populated, and very under developed. Most Arabs living in Palestine (not Palestinians as that term was not yet invented) did not own their land, they were tenants. Jewish settlers bought some of that land from the Turkish or other absentee owners. Arabs were not thrown out of houses they owned until the 1948 war where many Arabs left voluntarily at the behest of the fellow Arab military forces and others fled as a result of the hostilities. It is a sad fact that the Arabs chose a war of annihilation and lost it. Luckily for them, they were not themselves annihilated.

            The Arabs who fled could simply have fled into the rest of the Arab states including Palestine (Jordan) and the West Bank and Gaza. Many did flee there.

            As far as being stateless, they were stateless BEFORE they were offered a state and turned the state down, so they remained stateless. Stupid people. They should have then been absorbed into the other states as stateless Jews were absorbed into Israel, but they were kept as hostages to be used against Israel.

            Consider the loss of land reparations for launching an aggressive war against Israel just like Germany forfeited land after WW2 and Germans purged out of Poland and Czechoslovakia received no compensation.

          10. You’ve got your timeline all screwed up. Jews didn’t come and start ethnically cleansing anyone. Jewish refugees fled persecution, violence and genocide throughout the world (prior to and after WWII). The Arabs didn’t like it and used violence to try and chase away the refugees. When the UN created Jewish and Arab states the Arabs rejected and started a war. That’s when 700,000 Arab refugees fled or were forced out. Along those same lines, about the same number of Jews were forced out or fled from Arab controlled territories, including the West Bank, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Yemen, etc…

            Facts matter and you need to get them straight and stop spreading falsehoods.

          11. As far as creating Israel in Germany. That is so absurd and racist. It’s the same thing as a Trump supporter saying Muslim refugees shouldn’t be accepted in America or Europe because they aren’t “from here”. Or if they asked “Wouldn’t it make more sense for Muslim and Arab refugees to go to Arab and Muslim countries instead of Europe and American?” Or perhaps, “Do you expect Americans and Europeans to be happy about giving away land to Muslim and Arab refugees?” Come on now, those standards would be viewed as absurd and bigoted if it applied to you and your people.

          12. “Giving away Arab land”???? What made it Arab land? It was Ottoman land that was won by the British during WWI. That’s part of your main problem. All of your arguments are based on the fallacy that it was “Arab land”. It was NOT Arab land.

          13. I am an American (who knows what you are). Although leftists frequently accuse us of voter suppression of “people of color,” I’m glad you agree that is BS. Like the USA, Israel also gives full voting rights to all citizens, including Arabs or Muslims. So “I can say that about Israel.” Of course Arabs in the West Bank don’t vote because they are not citizens of Israel.

          14. Th illegal Jewish settlers in the West Bank are accorded all the rights and privileges of Israeli citizenship, even though they don’t live in Israel. Their Palestinian neighbors live under a belligerent military occupation that is now 50 years old. Israel grants citizenship to the settlers because they are Jewish. Israel refuses citizenship to the Palestinians because they are not Jewish. That is how the faux-democracy of Israel discriminates against people based on their ethnicity/religion.

          15. The settlers were already Israeli citizens, Israel did not “grant them” that. They don’t lost it by moving 15 miles into the West Bank. The Arabs were never Israeli citizens, they don’t get it by the fact Jordan attacked Israel and lost the West Bank as a result in 1967.

            Before 1967, the West Bank was annexed by Jordan. Did the West Bank Arabs get to vote then?

            The West Bank Arabs live under occupation because they are stupid and greedy. The Arabs rejected the Partition Plan or else they would have their own country. They chose decades of war and terrorism and lost more land. Still, however, the Arabs control the majority of Palestine (which includes the artificial state of Jordan). But that is not enough.

            Israel could decide to grant citizenship to West Bank Arabs if Israel annexes the West Bank. More likely Israel will annex only parts of it, grant citizenship to those people, and the remainder will be citizens of Jordan.

            Not every people in the world have their own state. For example the Kurds do not and they are a unique people while the West Bank Arabs are indistinguishable in language, culture and religion from Arabs in neighboring countries.

          16. “The settlers were already Israeli citizens. Israel did not grant them that.”

            Really? I’ve read there are over 60,000 American Jews currently living in settlements. What about them?

            What about all the European Jews that Netanyahu is always exhorting to “Come home to Israel!” They get citizenship requests granted, whether they live in Israel proper or the illegally occupied territories.

            And what about the steady influx of Russians immigrants? They are granted citizenship, some of them even if they are Christian but have one documented Jewish grandparent. They live in settlements.

            The first settlements, built in 1967, are now 50 years old. Plenty of children and grandchildren have been born in the interim, not in Israel, Because they are Jewish.

            “…while the West Bank Arabs are indistinguishable in language, culture and religion from Arabs in neighboring countries.”

            Not quite indistinguishable anymore. 50 years of living under a belligerent military occupation is a pretty distinguishing trait. That’s on Israel.

    2. Israel was founded by Jewish refugees who were fleeing years of persecution, violence and finally genocide. Your cowardly attempt to rewrite history is absolutely disgusting.

  16. Well I had not heard of this latest installment of hate, by the leftists, until today (Thanks to the mainstream medias censorship). Professor Keith Fink mentioned it during an interview with Tucker Carlson. It seems the first amendment is quite the bipolar entity on the UCLA campus.

    1. Thanks to you, I looked up that video clip which I found to be ridiculous. As if there’s anything “anti-Semitic” about this cartoon. It’s an excellent, caricature of Netanyahu and the nose is not an anti-semitic stereotypical Jewish nose, it’s just a caricature of Netanyahu’s nose. Of course this Fink guy plays the “anti-Semitic card” trying to squelch free speech, while he complains about his free speech being squelched. Ridiculous.

      Here’s the cartoon if you want to see it:

      http://mondoweiss.net/2017/02/defense-decision-netanyahu/

        1. Yeah Jews are so open minded when it comes to making fun of Muslims. They think racism is hilarious, unless its pointed at themselves.

          1. Perhaps you can share some examples of where mainstream Jews have thought that racism is hilarious. I’m not aware of that phenomenon. In my experience it’s always been just the opposite because of the long history of persecution and discrimination against Jews.

          2. Sure, Georges Wolinski was one of the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists that got gunned down, he was Jewish. Oor how about Jacob Weisberg, the head of Slate, who after the Hebdo shooting called for an escalation of blasphemous satire. He’s Jewish, right? Weisberg SOUNDS like a Jewish name to me.

            How about Pamela Geller? Didn’t she have a Mohammed cartoon drawing contest specifically to piss off Muslims? Isn’t Pamela Geller Jewish?

          3. OMG, you aren’t serious are you? Pamela Geller is hardly mainstream. And stereotyping someone who “sounds” Jewish?!?!? You really are a bigot, aren’t you! How sad and pathetic.

          4. “You really are a bigot, aren’t you?”

            In other words, you got nothing. So play the “anti-Semite” card. How predictable.

            Oh, and let me know when you find out that Jacob Weisberg is a Goy.

            LOL

          5. I got nothing? Hahaha! Why don’t you go back and look at some of my long detailed posts about the long and we’ll documented history of Israel and the Jewish people, as opposed to the significant lack of history of the “Palestinian” people and then get back to me. That’s far more important than you stereotyping people based on the sound of their last names. You can start by trying to explain how a people who have supposedly been around for “thousands of years” have no history of wars, have never had a famous leader before Arafat in the 1960s, never had their own borders, government, currency or anything else to prove that they were a distinct group of people as to opposed to being a group of Arabs living in an area controlled by the British and Ottoman Empires.

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