01/14 Links Pt1: From Salman Rushdie to Charlie Hebdo; Under Standing Charlie Hebdo

From Ian:

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Clifford May: From Salman Rushdie to Charlie Hebdo

Let's get a few things straight: The slaughter of eight satirical journalists in Paris last week was not a tragedy. It was an atrocity. And while you may have been shocked by the attack on Charlie Hebdo, anyone who was surprised has not been paying close attention to the events unfolding over recent decades.
In 1989, 10 years after the start of Iran's Islamic Revolution -- always intended as a global revolution -- Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini began to set down the Islamic laws he expected both Muslims and non-Muslims to follow -- not just in Iran but everywhere on Earth. He forbade criticism of the Quran and the Prophet Muhammad and issued a fatwa calling for the execution of Salman Rushdie, a British subject, for having written a novel that, in his eyes, was "against Islam."
European leaders had a choice: They could have stated forcefully that no foreign leader -- religious or political or, in this case, both -- would be permitted to restrict European freedoms. They could have conveyed that message by suspending diplomatic relations, imposing economic sanctions or threatening military action. Instead, they advised Rushdie to lay low and employ bodyguards.
Such fecklessness soon became routine. To take but one example: A year ago, the 32-year-old Iranian poet, Hashem Shaabani, a member of Iran's Arab minority, was hanged. He had not mocked Muhammad or made fun of the Quran. Indeed, it is not clear what he did to incur the ire of Iran's rulers. All we know is that he was found guilty of moharebeh -- war against God -- as well as "sowing corruption on earth." We also know that his death sentence was approved by Iran's president, the "moderate" Hassan Rouhani.
Though some human rights organizations issued strongly worded statements, Western apologists for the clerical regime were unmoved. Nor did Western diplomats revise their approach to Iran, their ardent quest to achieve detente with the Islamic republic. Within months, U.S. President Barack Obama was expressing confidence that "Iran can play a constructive role" in regard to the conflict in Iraq.

Kristol Blasts Iran for Hypocrisy on Charlie Hebdo Criticism

The Iranian government has condemned the newest cover of Charlie Hebdo, which depicts the prophet Mohammed holding a sign reading “Je suis Charlie” and with the title saying “that all is forgiven.”
Bill Kristol appeared on Morning Joe where he called out the hypocrisy of the Iranian Foreign Minister.
“The Iranian Foreign Minister condemning Charlie Hebdo, that’s rich,” said Kristol. “Iran began the business in 1989 of deciding that they could issue a fatwa in other countries. This is unbelievable! It’s one thing for them to have different views of free speech and blasphemy in their country. They are trying to export that to the West.”
NBC correspondent Bill Neely agreed with Kristol and mentioned evidence he saw when he was in Iran.
“The state run, the main state run newspaper, shows the crudest anti-Jewish, anti-Semitic cartoons. Thing that would make the staff of Charlie Hebdo blush,” Neely said. “It’s a bit rich for the Foreign Minister to say this latest cover is a little unhelpful.”

Kristol Blasts Iran for Hypocrisy on Charlie Hebdo Criticism


In Paris’s Muslim Suburbs, Some Blame Jews for Charlie

But even though the flags of Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia were flying at the rally in Place de la République and Muslims were well represented among the marchers Sunday, Boular said the attacks in Paris were part of a plot masterminded by Jewish conspirators.
“The Kalashnikovs, the identity cards the [killers] supposedly left behind, it was all staged,” said Boular, as his friends nodded in agreement. “It was a conspiracy designed by the Jews to make Muslims look bad. We’d rather just stay where we are.”
No use arguing. No use pointing out that one of the terrorists murdered four Jews. Conspiracy theories have their own unassailable logic, and this is a world apart from the displays of unity in Paris after the carnage of last week. French newspapers reported that some students in these neighborhoods—as well as other heavily Muslim areas near cities like Lille—refused to participate in Thursday’s national moment of silence for the victims of the terror attacks. One teacher said up to 80 percent of his students didn’t want to observe the silence, and some said they supported the attackers. “You reap what you sow,” a student who refused the moment of silence told his teacher in reference to the terrorists’ victims, according to Le Figaro.
Many spoke out against Israel and Jews as well as the United States but did not seem to have much of a grasp of geopolitics nor did they appear to be very religious in the traditional sense of the word.
Another young man of French-Algerian descent interviewed outside a gas station in the Saint-Denis suburb reacted angrily to a reporter’s presence and demanded to know her religion. “The worst thing is to be atheist,” he said.
The man, who gave his named as “Mohamed,” also said he was a devout Muslim but then changed his demeanor and added, grinning, that he was also “a delinquent.” Then he said he was a drug dealer and without prompting, invited the reporter into the (also very clean) gas station to show an array of hashish for sale in broad daylight on a shelf next to the ATM.
He also called the Paris terrorist attacks “un complot,” or conspiracy, and launched into a lengthy explanation of the “magical Jews” behind it. They were not ordinary Jews, he said, but a “hybrid race of shape shifters” who have extraordinary abilities. “They know how to get in everywhere,” he said. “They are master manipulators.”

Open Letter to the French President

Your Excellency, many Palestinians nearly fell off their chairs upon seeing their president march at the front row of a rally in your capital to protest against terrorism and assaults on freedom of the media.
Undoubtedly, you are unaware of the fact that President Abbas is personally responsible for punishing Palestinian journalists who dare to criticize him or express their views in public. Every day we see that the Western media, including French newspapers and magazines, does not care about such violations unless they are committed by Israel.
Your Excellency, you are completely mistaken if you believe that Abbas and his Palestinian Authority are tolerant toward satire or any form of criticism. While he was attending the rally, a human rights group published a report accusing the Palestinian Authority of "waging war" against university students in the West Bank.
President Abbas has managed once again to deceive you and the rest of the international community. He now has managed to create the false impression that he cares about freedom of speech and independent journalism
Palestinians like me will now pay a heaver price because Abbas has been emboldened and will now step up his assaults. France will be helping to establish another corrupt and repressive Arab dictatorship -- one that glorifies and rewards terrorists no different from those who carried out the Paris attacks.
I hope now your Excellency understands why I am too scared to reveal my identity.

JPost Editorial: Double standards

Double standards During a visit on Tuesday to the site of the murderous attack on a kosher grocery in eastern Paris, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu criticized the tendency to employ a double standard when it comes to Islamist terrorism.
Islamist terrorism must be fought everywhere, “even when it is against Israel and the Jews,” Netanyahu said.
A senior official, expanding on the prime minister’s message, told The Jerusalem Post’s Diplomatic Correspondent Herb Keinon that when murders are perpetrated by Islamist extremists against European journalists, there is “wall-to-wall horror” and no attempt is made to look for justification. But when Israelis or Jews are attacked, too often a link is drawn between the Islamic violence and the “occupation.”
This insidious distinction applied to Islamist-motivated violence when it is directed against Jews seems to have infected President François Hollande.
According to news reports, Hollande and others in the French government were opposed to Netanyahu’s participation in the multi-million rally against terrorism that took place in Paris on Sunday. Hollande reportedly did not want the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to deflect from the focus on solidarity with France.

'We told you so' - Israeli embassy in Ireland posts photo of Mona Lisa in Muslim headdress

“We told you so, France.”
That appears to be the message implied in a provocative tweet courtesy of the Israeli embassy in Ireland, which posted a photograph on its Twitter account on Wednesday featuring Mona Lisa decked out in Islamic garb while holding what appears to be a rocket.
The post seems to be a common sentiment among Israelis who are angry over what they perceive as the international community’s inability to empathize with its precarious security situation.

Andrew Neil - Islam squalid death cult


Dennis Prager: Why Is Islam Treated Better than Other Faiths?

Since 9/11, the Western world’s academic, media, and political elites have done their best to portray Islam in a favorable light, treating it very differently from all other religions. Criticism of every doctrine, religious or secular, is permitted, often encouraged. But not of Islam. Only positive depictions are allowed.
We’ll start with an example of pro-Islamic bias that is so ubiquitous that no one seems to notice it. Why do Western media — largely composed of irreligious people, one might add — always deferentially refer to Mohammed as “the Prophet Mohammed” in news articles and opinion pieces?
When Jesus is mentioned, the media never refer to him as “Christ, the Lord” or as “the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” Just “Jesus.” In fact, “A.D.” (“Anno Domini,” “In the Year of our Lord”) has been completely dropped by the very academics and media who always write “the Prophet Mohammed.”

Charlie Hebdo Lost

The West has the capacity to win a war on radical Islam. But it won't.
It won't because the West is too busy soul-searching to defend its core values. Western leaders mouth slogans about #JeSuisCharlie in the aftermath of the murder of 12 at the Charlie Hebdo headquarters, but they don't mean it; they suggest that the world stands united against radical Islamic terror even as they ignore the bullet-ridden bodies of four at a kosher supermarket in Paris.
The proof: Look at the list of those who attended Sunday's unity march in Paris.
The usual suspects showed up, except for President Obama, who was presumably too busy golfing or watching football. So, too, did several leaders explicitly connected with radical Islam and terrorism.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, showed up to tell the French people, "Human life is scared and God has created us all." But that's not what he tells his constituents. Last week, Al-Asima, a publication distributed by the Palestinian Authority, celebrated the murderers of five people at a synagogue in Jerusalem. Abbas routinely meets with terrorists who are released from prison after murdering Jews. As Hamas rained rockets down on Israel, Abbas justified it, telling the United Nations that Palestinians had the "legitimate right to resist this colonial, racist Israeli occupation."
But those are just dead Jews, so welcome to France!

Jimmy Carter: ICC should pursue war crimes investigation against Israel, Hamas

Former US president Jimmy Carter said on Wednesday that the International Criminal Court should probe both Israel and Hamas for possible war crimes committed during Operation Protective Edge.
In an interview with The Huffington Post, the Nobel laureate said that such an investigation would be “good for both sides.”
"I think it might be a good thing for the International Criminal Court to take an inquisitive look not only at what the Israelis have done to the Palestinians but vice versa," Carter said.
"I’ve been to the places in Israel where Hamas rockets land and I have been there and I’ve condemned the rockets on television, so there are problems both ways. But I think that to expose what has happened on both sides to the world in a very careful and judicial way will probably be good for both sides."
When asked if he believed Israel was guilty of war crimes in Gaza, Carter was noncommittal.
"I think that’s something to be determined by a legal investigation,” the former president said. “I don’t think there’s anything wrong with having the ICC investigate an allegation on both sides and then present their findings to the world.”

Jimmy Carter: Jews Safer in France than Israel

Carter’s claim came in response to a recent call by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu inviting France’s endangered Jews to move to Israel, the world’s only Jewish state.
Jews have fled Paris en massage due to growing anti-Semitism and the recent the massacre of Jews in a kosher food store by Islamic extremists. The editor of Britain’s Jewish Chronicle said that the problem is so bad that “every single French Jew I know has either left or is actively working out how to leave.”
However, Carter said that Jews are still safer in France than in “some place in Israel,” an apparent reference to areas often struck by terrorism from groups such as Hamas.
“My guess is that the Jews who live in France will maybe not take this as a positive step, and say the only way you can be safe is to go to Israel,” Carter said in an interview with HuffPost Live. “I would guess that you may be, on the average, maybe safer in France than some places in Israel, but I’m not trying to make a judgment.”
Carter also said that the recent attacks in Paris should provide an opportunity for the West to discover what makes Islam “great.”

Jimmy Carter: Jews 'Safer' In France Than Israel


The Left Comes Not to Praise Charlie Hebdo, but to Bury It

The problem with treating free speech as a “regrettable necessity” is that people who regret doing something are not difficult to dissuade. Free speech is tricky for an orderly society because people will inevitably use it to offend each other. Those who believe in centrally-planned society, in which order is imposed on a micro-managed level by a wise and powerful State, often find themselves thinking that offensive, disruptive speech isn’t worth fighting for. The ability to decide what constitutes unacceptably offensive speech is an enormous source of power, irresistibly appealing to the collectivist … especially when he’s pretty sure his preferred political team will end up wielding that power. The classical liberal finds the conflict between social harmony and unruly free speech a permanent, and often vexing, feature of free nations; the modern “liberal” has a long list of speech he’d love to prohibit and doesn’t mind tacking that list onto the demands from a “persecuted” minority.
“We have to condemn obvious racism as loudly as we defend the right to engage in it”? That’s not exactly a bold battle cry. Whoever said that racism, or even bad taste, should not be condemned? Condemnation is speech answering speech. Censorship is power obliterating speech. The former bears no relationship whatsoever to the latter. Anything less than unconditional defiance of censorship is a concession, and once that concession is on the table, negotiations for outright submission can begin.
As for whether Charlie Hebdo is the second coming of “The Satanic Verses”… remind me again what happened to the first coming–and its author? Many of Salman Rushdie’s defenders thought his book was poorly written, or found its subject matter offensive. Qualified defenses of free speech aren’t worth as much as full-throated defiance because the quality of speech should not be used to measure the value of freedom.

France’s new anti-Semitism

A surprising number of people have responded to the bloody slaughter in Paris by saying we shouldn’t have riled them up. “I don’t condone murder,” the argument goes, “but it’s wrong to provoke people by insulting their religion.”
So, what about the slaughter of Jewish shoppers in the kosher supermarket? What did the Jews do to rile them up?
Well, some people know. Gaza, etc. Nothing justifies the slaughter of innocent civilians, of course, but Israel’s atrocities are also a provocation.
In fact, for large parts of the world, Israel’s very existence is a provocation. And for Islamists, killing Jews is God’s work.
“As far as I am concerned, I feel I am Charlie Coulibaly,” declared Dieudonné, the anti-Semitic French comedian, on his Facebook page. He was referring to terrorist Amedy Coulibaly, who gunned down four Jews at a kosher supermarket. Dieudonné, whose appearances and videos feature long rants against Israel and the Jewish lobby, is wildly popular among young French North Africans.
Since the attacks in France, a lot of people have been warning about a backlash against Muslims that could strengthen Europe’s far right and possibly create a new brand of neo-Nazi threat. But the real threat to Europe comes from the kind of angry, disaffected young Muslims who regard Dieudonné as a hero.

Post-attack Charlie Hebdo sells out across France in minutes

People across France snapped up copies of French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo with a cartoon of the Prophet Mohammed on the cover Wednesday morning, as the weekly published its first edition since Islamist gunmen killed 12 people in an attack on its offices.
Three million copies of the weekly, featuring on the front a weeping prophet holding up a sign saying “Je suis Charlie” (“I am Charlie”) under the headline “All is forgiven”, have been printed.
The magazine was sold out in many parts of the capital minutes after going on sale.
The distributor announced it would increase the initial run from 3 million to 5 million to meet the demand.

Al-Qaeda in Yemen claims attack on Charlie Hebdo

A top leader of Yemen’s al-Qaeda branch claimed Wednesday responsibility for last week’s attack on a Paris newspaper when two masked gunmen killed 12 people, including much of the weekly’s editorial staff and two police officers.
Nasr al-Ansi, a top commander of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP as the branch is known, appeared in an 11-minute Internet video, saying that the massacre at Charlie Hebdo was in “vengeance for the prophet.” The paper had published cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, which is considered an insult in Islam.
“We, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, claim responsibility for this operation as vengeance for the messenger of Allah,” one of the group’s leaders, Nasser al-Ansi, said in the video.
Al-Ansi said France belongs to the “party of Satan” and warned of more “tragedies and terror.” He said Yemen’s al-Qaeda branch “chose the target, laid out the plan and financed the operation.”

Belgian arms dealer confesses to supplying Paris attackers

The terrorists who perpetrated the attacks in Paris last week got their weapons from an arms dealer in Brussels.
The dealer, a known figure in Brussels’ underworld, turned himself in to local police on Tuesday, according to Belgian media.
Federal police, who searched the suspect’s apartment, found papers linking him to a transaction with Amedy Coulibaly, the jihadist who murdered four Jewish men and held others hostage at the Hyper Cacher kosher supermarket in east Paris on Friday.
According to the local press, the man sold Coulibaly the Skorpion submachine guns he used in the attack, as well as the rocket propelled grenade launcher and the Kalashnikov automatic assault rifles that Said and Cherif Kouachi used to perpetrate the massacre at the offices of Charlie Hebdo. The weapons were purchased near the Midi railway station in downtown Brussels for less than 5,000 euros, according to the reports.

Charlie Hebdo Terrorists Held Up Gas Station with Grenade Launcher

Surveillance released yesterday shows the Charlie Hebdo terrorists holding up a gas station with a grenade launcher after slaughtering 12 people at the magazine's office.
Al Qaeda-linked brothers Cherif and Said Kouachi appear to be skulking around the gas station and snack shop, filling a black plastic bag with food, water and other items last Thursday while they were on the run from police a day after the newspaper attack, The Daily Mail reported.
Cherif Kouachi is shown with an RPG slung over his shoulder, reaching into a cooler to grab some drinks.

Tapper: French President Was First to Visit New York After 9/11

Fallowing up on his opinion piece Monday on CNN.com slamming the Obama Administration for not sending a high-level delegate to the Paris Unity March Sunday, Jake Tapper reiterated his concern over the message sent by the lack of U.S. presence at the historic march.
Speaking live from Paris Tapper reminded CNN viewers that France was the first nation to visit America after the 9/11 attacks:
“I think that it was beyond just optics. When you think back about 9/11… You also have to look at the fact of, who was the first world leader to come to the United States after the trauma in 2001 who was it? The President of France, Jacques Chirac came to Washington D.C. and New York right after 9/11, within a week and a half or so. I don’t think that’s a mistake. And we have a special relationship with this country.”
As CNN reported at the time, Chirac was shown around the devastation in New York by then-Mayor Giuliani:

WH Press Secretary: Not 'Accurate' To Call Paris Terrorism 'Radical Islam'

White House press secretary Josh Earnest said during the daily press briefing that the White House did not use the term “radical Islam” because they do not consider it “accurate.”
“The leader of France, your ally in this effort, has put a name on this ideology, which he calls radical Islam,” noted NPR’s Mara Liasson. “You have bent over backwards to not ever say that. There must be a reason.”
Earnest launched into a long explanation of the reasons for refusing to use the term “radical Islam”:
The first is accuracy. We want to describe exactly what happened. These are individuals who carried out an act of terrorism and they later tried to justify that act of terrorism by invoking the religion of Islam and their own deviant view of it.

MSNBC Stunned By White House Refusal to Label Paris Attack as Islamic Extremism


Israeli Minister Lauds ‘Heroic’ Yohan Cohen, Paris Terror Victim Slain Trying to Rescue Toddler (VIDEO)

Israeli Economy Minister Naftali Bennett on Monday described as “heroic” the attempt by 22-year-old Yohan Cohen to protect a toddler and thwart the terror shooting spree at a Paris kosher supermarket last Friday, Israel’s Ch. 2 News reported.
Cohen, an employee at the HyperCacher kosher supermarket in the city’s Porte de Vincennes neighborhood, was shot dead as he tried to protect a three-year-old and fire a gun that the Muslim terrorist, Amedy Coulibaly, had laid on a counter.
Coulibaly, who was armed with several weapons, shot Cohen dead as he tried to operate the jammed weapon, killed three other shoppers, and critically wounded another four.
“Your son was a hero,” Bennett told Cohen’s father, Eric, at a condolence call with the mourning family, held in the suburb of Sarcelle.

Liberman calls Turkey's Erdogan 'an anti-Semitic, neighborhood bully'

In some of the toughest public comments in memory against Erdogan and Turkey, Liberman told a gathering of Israel's ambassadors to Euro-Asia that Europe's Ignoring the hate and incitement Erdogan cultivates toward Israel has ramifications.
“The silence of the lambs of cultured Europe, politically correct Europe, toward a neighborhood and anti-Semitic bully like Erdogan and his friends brings us back to the reality of the 1930s,” he said.
Liberman, who seemed up until now to have been trying to move toward the political center, bucked that trend during the speech, calling for the ouster of Palestinian Authority head Mahmoud Abbas, who he accused of waging “diplomatic terror” against Israel.
The Foreign Minister said Abbas' anti-Israel moves in the diplomatic arena left Israel no choice but to act strongly in response, and that the transfer of tax funds to the PA that were frozen earlier this month should not be freed up again until Abbas is removed from power.
Liberman said that Abbas was an obstacle to any progress, and was concerned solely about his political survival, not a Palestinian state or the fate of the Palestinian people.
“The only way for him to cover his weakness against Hamas and his opposition is by waging war [against Israel] in the international arena,” he said. “That is the way he diverts attention on the Palestinian street, and that is how he comes out as a hero.”

Report: Turkish newspaper gets police protection after publishing Charlie Hebdo cartoon

Turkish riot police were deployed to protect the offices of a secular newspaper that published Charlie Hebdo’s latest front page cartoon featuring the Prophet Mohammed, the Financial Times reported on Wednesday.
The move came after Wednesday editions of Cumhuriyet included a four-page pullout of passages from the satirical weekly that were specially translated into Turkish.
The newspaper’s editor, Utku Cakirozer, said that police had vetted Wednesday’s edition before allowing it to be printed and sold on newsstands.
“Cumhuriyet, which has lost its own writers to terrorist attacks, understands the pain of the Charlie Hebdo massacre very well,” Çakırözer tweeted.
In years past, the newspaper has lost reporters who were murdered – allegedly by Islamist radicals – for articles that were published.
According to Financial Times, a car bomb killed Ugur Mumcu, an investigative reporter, in 1993. Six other journalists who worked for the newspaper were also killed.

Ankara Mayor Claims Israel Behind French Terror Attack

The longtime mayor of Ankara accused Israel’s Mossad of masterminding last week’s terror attacks in France.
Melih Gokcek said Israeli intelligence planned the attacks in retaliation for France recently expressing support for Palestinian statehood, according to Today’s Zaman, an English-language Turkish publication, citing the Andalou news agency.
At a political event Sunday, Gokcek said it “is certain that Mossad is behind these kinds of incidents. Mossad enflames Islamophobia by causing such incidents.”
The head of Turkey’s capital city also claimed that following the Paris attacks, approximately 50 mosques and some Muslim individuals were targeted but there was no coverage from the international media.

Assad Says Paris Attacks Due to Western 'Terrorism'

In his first reaction to the attacks on the Charlie Hebdo magazine and a Jewish supermarket in which a total of 17 people were murdered by Islamist terrorists, Assad said he had repeatedly warned Western governments that their support for rebel groups in Syria risked a blowback of violence at home.
"We need to remind many in the West that we have warned of such incidents since the beginning of the crisis in Syria," he told Czech newspaper Literarni Noviny in an interview to be published on Thursday.
"We kept saying you must not support terrorists or give them political cover, or else this will impact your countries and your peoples," he said in excerpts carried by the Syrian Arab News Agency.

Rabbi Sacks: When Anti-Semitism Begins to Hit a Continent, Then That’s a Bad Sign for Everyone.

Rabbi Sacks, former Chief Rabbi of the United Kingdom, called the coming together of the French people a positive mark against radical Islam. After the terrorist attacks on the Kosher market and at Charlie Hebdo, the French public began carrying signs reading “Je Suis Juif” and “Je Suis Charlie.” He called for France to step up and get tougher on anything that looked like anti-Semitism.
“When anti-Semitism begins to hit a continent then that’s a bad sign for everyone. Because the hate that begins with Jews doesn’t end with Jews,” Rabbi Sacks said.
Great Britain has remained tolerant of the Jewish community and has seen an increase of French Jews moving to the country to seek a more tolerant society. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also told French Jews that Israel is their refuge.
“Europe should not be importing a message of tension and hostility from the Middle East. It should be exporting a message of coexistence from Europe to the Middle East,” Rabbi Sacks said.

Rabbi Sacks: 'When Anti-Semitism Begins to Hit a Continent Then That's a Bad Sign for Everyone.'


Polls show British Jews fear for future amid anti-Semitic climate

A poll of 2,230 British Jewish people by the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism (CAA) found that 45 percent feared Jews have no future in Britain, and 58% were concerned they have no long-term future in Europe.
The online survey was conducted from December 23 to January 11 — a period that spanned the attacks in Paris that targeted the Charlie Hebdo magazine and a kosher supermarket, leading France to increase security at Jewish schools and synagogues.
A second survey, conducted by pollster YouGov for the CAA, found anti-Semitic views to be common among British people.
Of the 3,411 adults surveyed, 45% believed at least one statement defined as anti-Semitic.
A quarter of those polled believed Jewish people chase money more than other British people.
Meanwhile, 17% thought Jews had too much power in the media, and 13% said Jews talked about the Holocaust to get sympathy.
“The results of our survey are a shocking wake-up call straight after the atrocities in Paris,” said CAA chairman Gideon Falter.
“Britain is at a tipping point. Unless anti-Semitism is met with zero tolerance, it will grow and British Jews will increasingly question their place in their own country.”

Leading British Politician Says Country’s Jews ‘Definitely’ Don’t Need to Move

Prominent British politician William Hague, the Leader of the House of Commons, told members of Britain’s Jewish community on Monday that there is no need for them to leave the country amid fear of antisemitism following last week’s terrorist attacks in Paris, the UK’s Jewish News reported on Tuesday.
“We in the government and security services will work hard to keep everybody safe but that requires the participation of all communities, to give a strong lead and show that terrorism is the wrong way,” Hague said at an event held at the JW3 Jewish center. He reassured community members that they “definitely” don’t need to leave Britain.

British MP panned for saying Netanyahu in Paris made him sick

MP David Ward, a member of Clegg’s Liberal Democrat party, posted a short message on his Twitter account as some 50 visiting heads of state and top diplomats led the march through the streets of the French capital on Sunday.
“#Netanyahu in Paris march – what!!!! Makes me feel sick,” Ward wrote at the time.
Israeli Ambassador Daniel Taub sent a letter to Clegg demanding that Ward be taken to task for his comment.
“It gives me no pleasure to write to you once again to express my abhorrence at statement made by David Ward MP, on this occasion with regard to the presence of the Prime Minister of Israel at the solidarity march in Paris,” Taub wrote.

White House: Rising Tide of Anti-Semitism 'Troubling'

The White House voiced alarm Tuesday at a surge in anti-Semitism in Europe and the world, after last week's attack in Paris on a kosher supermarket, in which four Jewish people were murdered.
"The violent assault on the Jewish community in France that took place on Friday afternoon (...) was the latest in a series of very troubling incidents in Europe and around the world that reflect a rising tide of anti-Semitism," White House chief of staff Denis McDonough said at an American Jewish committee event in a Washington synagogue.
"On behalf of the president (Barack Obama) I am here to affirm our nations' solidarity to the French people and the Jewish community in France, and around the world, to condemn in the strongest possible terms the violent attacks of last week" on the supermarket, and at satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo where 12 people were murdered. All together, including a policewoman shot dead in a related incident, 17 people lost their lives in the three-day murder spree.
"We will not waver in our commitment to combat the scourge of antisemitism," McDonough stressed, adding that: "from the President on down, you have my commitment that we will wage this fight tirelessly, and together."

UK shops to receive Charlie Hebdo magazine despite radical cleric calling it an "act of war"

Radical preacher Anjem Choudray has criticised the magazine's controversial cartoon front cover of the Prophet Mohammed as "an act of war" and warned there will be "repercussions".
The latest edition is published a week after many of the Charlie Hebdo editorial team were massacred in an attack at their Paris office which saw terrorist brothers Said and Cherif Kouachi kill 12 people.
Five of Charlie Hebdo's cartoonists - including the editor - were killed in the attack.
Smiths News and Menzies are expected to be purchasing up to a 2,000 copies to supply to stores in the Uk.
Radical cleric Mr Choudary said "ridiculing" Mohammed is attacking his personality, and said these actions are "extremely serious", adding that if the "act of war" was to be tried in a Shariah Court it would carry capital punishment.
"It's not just a cartoon, it's insulting, it's ridiculing, it's provoking," he said.

French comedian Dieudonne arrested over Facebook post

Dieudonne’s arrest is one of 54 cases that have been opened in France for “condoning terrorism” or “making threats to carry out terrorist acts” since last week’s Islamist shootings that left 17 people dead. Several have already been convicted under special measures for immediate sentencing.
Four minors were among those arrested.
The government is also working on new phone-tapping and other intelligence efforts against terrorism that it wants nailed down by next week, government spokesman Stephane Le Foll said Wednesday.

Jewish-owned D.C. business targeted by self-described ISIS militants

For the past five months a barrage of phone calls and internet postings have threatened employees. The callers vow to carry out mass murder.
ABC7 News is not identifying the business nor any individuals because of the sensitive nature of these threats.
The business is Jewish owned and some of the threats are anti-Semitic while others are racial or homophobic.
The recent terrorist attacks in Paris have employees worried.
The owner says D.C. police investigated but handed the case over to Homeland Security, which deemed the threats not credible.
Verizon says the calls are traceable but it needs police to ask it to take action.

Egyptian cleric warns Charlie Hebdo against publishing "racist" cartoons

Egypt's Grand Mufti warned the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo on Tuesday against publishing a new caricature of the Prophet Mohammad, saying it was a racist act that would incite hatred and upset Muslims around the world.
Charlie Hebdo is due to publish a front page on Wednesday showing a caricature of the Prophet in its first edition since Islamist gunmen attacked the weekly's offices in Paris last Wednesday, killing 12 people.
"This edition will cause a new wave of hatred in French and Western society in general and what the magazine is doing does not serve coexistence or a dialogue between civilisations," the office of Grand Mufti Shawqi Allam, one of the region's most influential Muslim clerics, said in a statement.
"This is an unwarranted provocation against the feelings of ... Muslims around the world."

Fake News From the Holy Land

When a European Union court ruled in December that the Palestinian militant organization Hamas should be removed from the EU’s list of designated terrorist organizations, Israeli newspapers across the political spectrum made the news their top story. But one of them, an online publication called The Israeli Daily, took a decidedly different angle.
“Hamas to EU: Put us back on terrorism blacklist immediately,” read the headline. The story’s author quoted a Hamas spokeswoman as saying, “We’re very upset over this. We’ve worked hard to build a brand name for ourselves, including some serious brainwashing of children. … What will it take to remain on the list?”
The Israeli Daily is a satire site, one of a crop of eager young publications, in both English and Hebrew, that have joined the crowded Israeli media market in the past year. Taking their inspiration in part from the American satirical newspaper The Onion, the editors and writers of these low-budget sites are staking a claim over the region’s news and attempting to spin it into comedic gold. The stakes are high, emotionally and perhaps even physically. Making fun of extremists, as the world saw in last Wednesday’s massacre at Charlie Hebdo’s headquarters in Paris, can have horrific consequences.

But the way Israel’s new web satirists describe it, their goal is less to lampoon fundamentalists than to get their friends and neighbors to lighten up. The subjects in the news here—terrorism, extremism, and the endless replay of the same grinding war—are deadly serious. The specter of loss follows everyone. That’s precisely why it’s important to keep laughing, the editors say.

Under Standing Charlie Hebdo

Charlie Hebdo's satire
The brand of humor in Charlie Hebdo is very particular, and somewhat unique to France. It is absurdist (in the tradition of Rubrique-à-Brac), a type of humor comparable to MAD magazine and Viz in terms of anglo-saxon publications. It is also extremely satirical, comparable to The Onion and The Colbert Report, e.g. saying Charlie Hebdo is homophobic is as absurd as saying Stephen Colbert is right-wing, or that Ali-G is racist. Charlie Hebdo humour is often crass and shows a complete lack of respect for many institutions, à la South Park.
Charlie Hebdo employs their rather brutal satire against dogma, hypocrisy and hysteria, regardless of its source. Satire works by toying with different levels of interpretation (irony) – a fundamentally subjective endeavour which in the hands of Charlie Hebdo is sure to leave bitter aftertastes. Humor is not a requirement.
The cartoons shown below are a small selection of the broad range of topics that Charlie Hebdo covers. There are plenty of cartoons that are simply making fun of Francois Hollande or Nicolas Sarkozy. It's important to keep this in mind, as otherwise it is very easy to conclude, when only presented with a handful of cartoons, that Charlie Hebdo covers only the topics below. In reality the cartoons touch upon a wide variety of topics, but always play stupid and mean with them (« bête et méchant »), see this excellent comment on reddit for more on this.