News From Israel – June 9, 2020

ILTV Israel News

Jeremy Piven on Performing Stand-Up Comedy in Israel: ‘It Was the Best Set I Ever Had’

Shiryn Ghermezian

Jeremy Piven participating in a Zoom call with other comics organized by Creative Community for Peace. Photo: Screenshot.

Jewish American comic and actor Jeremy Piven performed his best stand-up act ever when he was in Israel last year, he said on Wednesday.

The “Entourage” star participated in a panel of comedians who discussed their past trips to the Jewish state and the comedy industry in a Zoom call and Facebook Live event organized by the non-profit group Creative Community for Peace.

Piven traveled to Israel for the first time in 2016 on a trip sponsored by the Omri Casspi Foundation. He was part of a delegation of NBA players and celebrities and during the trip he had his “second bar mitzvah” celebration in Jerusalem.

He went back to Israel in 2019 and performed as a stand-up comic. He said on Wednesday about the experience, “It was the best set I ever. I’m not just saying that. I don’t know what it was…for some reason it kind of felt really incredible, and I had a great time and so did they [the audience].”

He added, “I think because they are so incredibly present, and they’re dealing with danger on another level, as an audience I’ve never seen an audience that was more present than that.”

Piven — who currently does over 200 stand-up shows a year — also cited Jewish-American comedian and actor Elan Gold as a mentor.

Piven additionally elaborated on his bar mitzvah at the age of 13, which he said took place in a church. He explained that he was comfortable being on stage during his Torah reading, but that his Hebrew was “viciously mediocre.”

Regarding his “second bar mitzvah” in Jerusalem in 2016, he said it “was the greatest time of my life.”

He added, “it was incredible to also share this experience to all these pro athletes that had never been to a bar mitzvah. They were using the yarmulkes as frisbees, no one knew what to do with them.”

Fighting Trump plan, hilltop youth may go where no settler has before: Area A

JACOB MAGID

Far-right activists launch ‘It’s all ours’ campaign, plotting outposts in Palestinian parts of West Bank that other settlers have shied from

(From L-R) “It’s all ours” campaign organziers Elisha Yered, Yedidya Shapira and Yonatan Levi on June 3, 2020. (It’s all ours campaign)

Dozens of far-right Israeli activists have launched a campaign aimed at foiling the Trump peace plan that they say will include establishing outposts in parts of the West Bank that are earmarked for the Palestinian state envisioned by the proposal.

Organizers of the “It’s all ours” campaign say their efforts will progress in three stages during the coming weeks leading up to the July 1 date on which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to begin advancing annexation of parts of the West Bank with US backing.

The campaign marks the latest effort to oppose the Trump plan, which despite its envisioning of Israel annexing all West Bank settlements in addition to the Jordan Valley, has faced significant opposition from settler leaders, senior figures in the national religious camp, and now younger, ultra-nationalist activists as well.

The first stage of the “It’s all ours” campaign was launched late Thursday night and saw over 100 hilltop youth and students from national religious yeshivas around the country plastering over 5,500 fliers along roads and bus stops throughout the West Bank, warning against “the danger of the division of the land that is on the horizon.”

An IDF soldier stands at a guard post in the West Bank plastered with signs against the Trump peace plan. (Dror Etkes)

The “It’s all ours” organizers say the next stage will include rallies and marches  throughout the West Bank as early as later this week.

The campaign will then climax with the establishment of illegal outposts in “strategic areas” beyond the Green Line, regardless of whether they are located in Areas A, B, or C.

Until now, Israeli settlers have focused almost exclusively on settling in Area C — the 60% of the West Bank, which according to the 1995 Oslo Accords falls under Israeli security and civilian control. A handful of outposts have gone up in Area B where Israel has security control, but the Palestinian Authority is in charge of civilian matters, but Israeli security forces have worked to swiftly demolish such illegal building. Area A, on the other hand, is under full PA control and has rarely experienced any attempts by Israelis to settle there.

“Our mission is to break through the current boundaries of settlement. If we settle with existing communities, we will lose most of Judea and Samaria and establish a Palestinian state will be established there,” the campaign organizers wrote on the thousands of fliers distributed throughout the West Bank.

“It’s all ours” campaign activists hang up fliers against the Trump plan in the West Bank on June 3, 2020. (It’s all ours campaign)

“We can only demand where we settle,” Shapira said, echoing a major tenant of the Trump peace plan, which states that no Israelis or Palestinians will be uprooted from their homes as a part of its “realistic two state solution.”

He revealed that before the pandemic, the campaign leadership had already started scoping out hilltops for the establishment of new wildcat communities.

Shapira said he was not concerned about the risks establishing remote outposts in areas that are under PA control. “The IDF is responsible for the security of Israelis no matter where they are and they’ll protect us.”

Posters against the Trump peace plan in the West Bank. (It’s All Ours campaign)

Asked whether there was any strategic value in accepting the Trump plan in order to receive US backing for annexation of at least part of the West Bank, when the PA is almost certain to reject an offer for statehood on what remains, another member of the campaign, Sarah Miriam Malt emphatically rejected the idea.

“Opposing the division of the land is a fundamental belief based on the Bible. I have no moral right to give that of because the moment I do so, we lose the legitimacy of our claims,” said the 27-year-old mother of four from the Geulat Zion outpost in the central West Bank.

Despite the rather homogeneous makeup of the “it’s all ours” supporters, Malt insisted that a majority of Jewish Israelis support their goals and recognize that “we have a right to be here and that no other people has such a right.” The goal of the campaign, she argued, is to “awaken the public” in the hopes that more will join them in acting upon that prerogative.

News From Israel – June 7, 2020

ILTV Israel News

Israelis Protest Netanyahu’s Annexation Plan

Reuters and Algemeiner Staff

Demonstrators protest under coronavirus restrictions against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to annex parts of the West Bank in Tel Aviv, Israel, June 6, 2020. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen.

Thousands of Israelis demonstrated on Saturday against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to extend sovereignty over parts of the West Bank, the de-facto annexation of land that the Palestinians seek for a state.

Protesting in face masks and keeping their distance from each other under new coronavirus restrictions, the demonstrators gathered under the banner “no to annexation, no to occupation, yes to peace and democracy.”

The Palestinians want an independent state in the West Bank, east Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip, territories Israel captured in the 1967 Six-Day War.

A Reuters photographer and Israeli media estimated the protesters gathered at Tel Aviv’s Rabin square numbered a few thousand. A poll published this week found that about half of all Israelis support annexation.

Netanyahu has set July 1 as the target date to begin advancing his plan to annex Israel’s settlements and the Jordan Valley in the West Bank, hoping for a green light from Washington.

US President Donald Trump in January unveiled a peace plan which includes Israel keeping its settlements and the Palestinians establishing a state under stringent conditions.

Palestinians have rejected the proposal and voiced outrage against Israel’s proposed annexation.

Warning of possible violence and diplomatic repercussions, some European and Arab states, together with the United Nations, have urged Israel to step back from the plan to annex its settlements.

Some commentators have said that the Trump administration, gripped by the coronavirus crisis and a wave of national protests against police abuse, was not looking to risk further instability by giving Israel the go-ahead for annexation.