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CHAG SUCCOT SAMEACH! 16 October 2024 • 14 Tishrei 5785 • Issue No.1389 •
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UK planned to sanction Ben-Gvir and Smotrich Foreign secretary ‘worked up’ plans against Israel’s far-right ministers before he left office David Cameron planned to sanction two Israeli ministers before the Conservative government left office, the former foreign secretary has revealed, writes Lee Harpin. Lord Cameron told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme he had been “working up” sanctions on Israeli finance minister Bezalel Smotrich and national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir as a way of putting “pressure on Netanyahu” to act within international law. He said: “Before we left office I was working up sanctions on these two ministers, Smotrich and Ben-Gvir, who, when you look at what they say, they have said things like encouraging people to stop aid convoys going into Gaza. They have encouraged extreme settlers in the West Bank with some of the appalling things they have been carrying out. “So, actually saying to Netanyahu, ‘yes, we support your right to self-defence, no, we are not going to end the sale of arms. But when there are ministers in your government who are extremists and behave in this way, we are prepared to use our sanctions regime to say this is not good enough and it has to stop’.” Cameron also urged the current government
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‘Extremists’: Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir
to “look again at this sanctions issue” rather than go down the “wrong path” of suspending arms exports. Asked why the sanctions did not go ahead, he said he had been advised that it would have been “too much of a political act” during the election. In his BBC interview, Cameron continued to defend the thrust of Israel’s policy to eradicate the threat posed by the terrorist groups Hamas and Hezbollah. He said: “On 7 October Israel was not just attacked Continued on page 2
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IN 1492, COLUMBUS SAILED THE OCEAN AS A JEW
Christopher Columbus’ heritage is the subject of academic research
Christopher Columbus was likely to have been Jewish, according to Spanish researchers in a documentary shown by the country’s national broadcaster last weekend. According to the programme, the researchers spent 22 years looking into Columbus’ national origins before concluding that bones buried in a cathedral in Seville are in fact the
explorer’s – and that his DNA suggests he came from a Jewish family. “We have DNA from Christopher Columbus, very partial, but sufficient,” lead researcher José Antonio Lorente, at the University of Granada, said in the documentary. “Both in the Y chromosome (male) and in the mitochondrial DNA (transmitted by the mother),
there are traits that are compatible with Jewish origin.” Whether the findings are accurate may never be known. The forensic scientists have not yet released their raw data, and their report has not yet been peer-reviewed. A Spanish report says the research will appear in an international scientific journal in the near future.
Researchers who study Columbus say the purported findings are of only limited significance, even if true. DNA evidence would show only Jewish heritage, rather than identity, they say. And Columbus’ own writings express both Christian beliefs and praise for the decree expelling Jews from Spain.