Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Sunday, December 20, 2015

12/20 Links: Smadar Haran, whose family Kuntar killed, hails ‘justice’; Making the case for Israel

From Ian:

Smadar Haran, whose family Kuntar killed, hails ‘justice’

A Lebanese Druze, Kuntar became infamous for a brutal 1979 raid from Lebanon in which he and several accomplices kidnapped an Israeli family from Nahariya, then smashed the head of a four-year-old Israeli girl, Einat Haran, with his rifle butt and stones, killing her.
Three other Israelis, including her father, Danny Haran, were killed in the attack. Kuntar was 16 at the time, and a member of the Palestine Liberation Front.
“They called me at 4 a.m, I woke up and thought about the years that passed, how historic justice had been made,” Smadar Haran told Army Radio.
During the attack, Smadar Haran hid from Kuntar with her two-year-old daughter Yael, but accidentally smothered her to death in an effort to silence her cries.
Roni Haran, the brother of Danny Haran, told the Ynet news website he “waited for this moment for seven years, since Kuntar was released from prison.”
“Samir Kuntar never regretted his actions, and there is a small consolation in this [his assassination], although it doesn’t take away the pain,” he said.
“I hope that this gets the message across that whoever murders Jews in Israel and in the world will end up like Samir Kuntar and the Munich murderers [of Israeli athletes],” Haran added. “As it stands, in the Middle East, this seems like the only language they understand.”
Reports said that Kuntar, who was targeted in a residential building in a suburb of Damascus late Saturday night, was assassinated not as revenge for his past actions, but rather because he was planning fresh attacks against Israel. Syrian media said that among the dead was also Farhan Shaalan, a commander in the Syrian anti-Israel resistance group founded by Kuntar and others. Those reports said that senior Hezbollah members were also present in the building at the time of the attack.

Smadar Haran Kaiser (2003): The World Should Know What He Did to My Family

Abu Abbas, the former head of a Palestinian terrorist group who was captured in Iraq on April 15, is infamous for masterminding the 1985 hijacking of the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro. But there are probably few who remember why Abbas's terrorists held the ship and its 400-plus passengers hostage for two days. It was to gain the release of a Lebanese terrorist named Samir Kuntar, who is locked up in an Israeli prison for life. Kuntar's name is all but unknown to the world. But I know it well. Because almost a quarter of a century ago, Kuntar murdered my family.
It was a murder of unimaginable cruelty, crueler even than the murder of Leon Klinghoffer, the American tourist who was shot on the Achille Lauro and dumped overboard in his wheelchair. Kuntar's mission against my family, which never made world headlines, was also masterminded by Abu Abbas. And my wish now is that this terrorist leader should be prosecuted in the United States, so that the world may know of all his terrorist acts, not the least of which is what he did to my family on April 22, 1979.

JCPA: Hizbullah’s Golan Heights Front Loses its Leader

Samir Kuntar, a Lebanese Druze, was killed on December 20, 2015 in an air raid on a building in Jaramana, outside of Damascus. Kuntar was a senior Hizbullah terrorist who was establishing a new front against Israel on the Syrian Golan Heights with Iranian, Syrian and Hizbullah assistance. In 1979, Kuntar led a brutal Palestinian Liberation Front terrorist attack in northern Israel in which he pummeled a four-year-old to death before shooting her father. He sat in Israeli prison until he was exchanged in 2008 for the bodies of two Israeli soldiers held by Hizbullah in Lebanon.
The following article, written in May 2015, puts Kuntar’s activities into context.
Following Israel’s airstrike against an Iranian general and Hizbullah commanders who were surveying the Golan front near Kuneitra on January 18, 2015, there was an assessment that the military infrastructure built by Iran and Hizbullah had been exposed and dismantled.
The failed attempt by four terrorists to infiltrate the northern Golan Heights on April 25, 2015 to plant explosive devices proves that the assessment was mistaken. Moreover, the attempt revealed Hizbullah’s efforts to recruit fighters from Druze villages in the areas controlled by the Syrian army. Hizbullah activities among the Druze are led by Samir Kuntar, who succeeded in recruiting and uniting Druze activists, some residents of Majdal Shams (in the Israeli-controlled Golan), to carry out military acts against Israel.

It is always a pleasure to discover a writer / thinker whose thoughts can serve as a sort-of baseline, or measure, of one's own.

Neuroscientist / Philosopher Sam Harris is just such a guy.

His first book is a 2004 offering entitled, The End of Faith. His most recent isIslam and the Future of Tolerance: A Dialogue, co-written with British Muslim reformer, Maajid Nawaz.

For most of his career Harris wrote about the intersection between faith, rationality, and cognition from the perspective of a mystically-inclined atheistneuroscientist.

{To those of you who may wonder how one can be both an atheist and mystically-inclined one need only point to the example of Mahayana Buddhism.}

In recent years, however, he has focused on the rise of political Islam and the theocratic-ideological roots of that heinous head-chopping movement. His interlocutor, Nawaz, is a Muslim reformer and former Islamist. Both men overcame their ideological differences in order to find common ground and both serve as a model on how to speak with those with whom we may have serious disagreements.

I want to emphasize two aspects of Harris' thinking that very much caught my attention and that I take simply to be commonsense... but important and often overlooked commonsense. These are the link between behavior and belief and the significance of intention as an ethical matter and oneof predicting likely future behavior. Harris relates both to political Islam and the ongoing siege of the Jews in the Middle East.

The Link Between Behavior and Belief

Academics, politicians, and journalists have been searching high-and-low for thereasons why Jihadis rammed two commercial jets into the World Trade Center, killing around three thousand innocent people on September 11, 2001, and the subsequent rise of political Islam throughout the Middle East and Europe following the so-called "Arab Spring."

The answers put forth by the purveyors of public opinion generally center aroundsocio-economic factors and the history of western and American imperialism in the Middle East.

In this way the West tends to blame itself for the violence against it.

What Harris suggests is that if we want to understand the rise of political Islam then we must listen to what they have to say about themselves. What he, therefore, argues is that there is a direct and obvious line between belief and behavior.

Belief drives behavior.

Thus if we listen to what the Islamists say about themselves it becomes clear that they are primarily driven by a fundamentalist, Salafist, seventh-century vision of Islamic dominance and the restoration of the Caliphate under al-Sharia and all the head-chopping that entails.

This does not mean that political or socio-economic factors should be dismissed.

What this does mean - despite Barack Obama's admonishments otherwise - is that the reasons for the rise of the Jihad are directly connected to Islamic primary sources, i.e., the Qur'an and the hadiths.

Chomksy and the Significance of Intention

Harris, like numerous others before him, recently clashed with MIT linguist and left political icon, Noam Chomsky.

Harris approached Chomsky in the hope that, as with his conversation with Nawaz,they could explore the political and ideological differences between them, within the academic tradition of collegiality, and thereby lay-out in a coherentmanner their differences for you and I to consider.

This was not to be and Harris published the email conversation between the two of them as a lesson on the difficulty of speaking entrapped within what I call "ideological blinkertude."

What struck me most about the conversation, however, was Harris' focus on the ethical significance of intention.

Chomsky is, essentially, a peddler of the moral equivalency canard. He hassuggested that there is no greater source of terrorism in the world outside of Washington D.C.

In support of his thesis he notes Bill Clinton's 1998 bombing of the l-Shifa pharmaceutical plantin Sudan and suggests that the negative effects on Sudanese society were at least as bad, and probably far worse, than anything that the United States suffered after 9/11.

Clinton claimed that the plant was manufacturing chemical weapons and had ties with al-Qaeda, which is why it needed to be taken out. Chomksy claims thatthe attack was a wanton act of retaliation for the US embassy bombing that left 200 dead in that same country, that sameyear.

What Harris argues is that the difference is one of intention and that intentionmatters. The people who flew those commercial jets into the World Trade Center intended to kill as many innocent people as possible. Clinton, if we can believe his own stated intentions, did not desire to aimlessly murder people, but to prevent the creation of chemical weaponry in Sudan coming directly on the heels of the embassy bombing.

Harris, I would argue, is quite correct.

Intention does matter both for ethical reasons and because it indicates how the actor is likely to behave in the future.

Chomsky may argue that the "road to hell is paved with good intentions," and he is undoubtedly correct, but from an ethical perspective intention still matters and, as Harris points out, it demonstrates the likely behavior of the individualor the group going forward.

Will the Real Racist Please Stand Up?

I first became aware of Harris when Ben Affleck decided to get into his face on Bill Maher's Real Time a few months ago:

Essentially, all Harris said, quite rightly, is that criticisms of the doctrinesof Islam get immediately conflated, on the progressive-left, with bigotry or "racism" toward Muslims as people.

Then, not surprisingly, the well-meaning Ben Affleck rushed forward to do precisely that.

Affleck is an intelligent guy - as I am sure that Matt Damon can attest- but he is wrong to conflate criticisms of Islamic doctrine, or criticisms of political Islam, with bigotry towards Muslims, in general.

In fact, without realizing it, Affleck slipped into the very bigotry that he claims to find "gross."

Anyone who thinks that criticism of political Islam (or radical Islam or Islamism) is the same as bigotry toward Muslims, in general, is unwittingly suggesting that all Muslims are essentially Jihadis.

Now that is bigotry.

Ben Affleck is a serious guy, a significant artist, writer, producer, actor, andan intelligent man with a heart in the right place.

But he is simply wrong on this matter.

I very much hope that upon reflection he gives Harris the consideration that hiswork deserves.

Michael Lumish is a blogger at the Israel Thrives blog as well as a regular contributor/blogger at Times of Israel and Jews Down Under.

This blog may be a labor of love for me, but it takes a lot of effort, time and money. For over 11 years and over 22,000 articles I have been providing accurate, original news that would have remained unnoticed. I've written hundreds of scoops and sometimes my reporting ends up making a real difference. I appreciate any donations you can give to keep this blog going.

Reuters calls child-murderer Kuntar a "martyr" - without scare-quotes (update)

Here is how Reuters reports the death of child-murderer Samir Kuntar:

Lebanese militant Samir Qantar killed in Israeli raid: Hezbollah group

Lebanese militant leader Samir Qantar was killed in an Israeli strike that hit a building in the Damascus district of Jaramana in the early hours on Sunday, the Lebanese Hezbollah group and Syrian government loyalists said.

The powerful Lebanese Hezbollah group said Qantar was martyred in an Israeli aerial raid on a residential district of the Syrian capital Damascus but gave no details.

An Israeli cabinet minister welcomed on Sunday the killing of Qantar but stopped short of confirming allegations that Israel was responsible.

Israel released Qantar, a Druze, in 2008 as part of a prisoner swap with the Lebanese Shi'ite Hezbollah group and he is believed to have joined the group since.

He was welcomed as a hero in Beirut and he married a Lebanese Shi'ite woman from a Hezbollah family.

Reuters doesn't even put the word "martyred" in scare-quotes. Obviously its reporter, Mariam Karouny, agrees with the characterization of Kuntar as a "martyr" and Reuters' copy-editors did not disagree (or notice.)

Nor does this Reuters article mention once why Kuntar was in Israeli prison to begin with. He's just a Hezbollah "militant."

CNN at least mentions his terror attacks, even if it also called him a "militant."

Belgium's De Reactie called him a "militant" but mentioned that he was part of a terror cell in 1979.

Germany's Die Welt and Belgium's De Morgen called him an "extremist."

Denmark's Avisen leads by describing Kuntar as "one of the most hated people in Israel."

Svenka Dagbladet (Sweden) mentions that he was convicted for murdering three people but does not elaborate.

AFP calls him a "senior Hezbolah figure" but mentions his terror attack in the first paragraph.

All of these are far better than the disgusting Reuters coverage.

Surprisingly, the best non-Israeli coverage of his death comes from The Inside Korea, whose headline is "Israeli rockets kill notorious terrorist Samir Quntar in Damascus."

(h/t Yenta)

UPDATE: Reuters now put "martyred" in quotes. It was done within an hour of this post.

Reports: arch-terrorist Samir Kuntar finally killed in Israeli airstrike

JPost says:

A number of rockets hit a building in the Damascus district of Jaramana causing several casualties, Syria's state media said early on Sunday. It blamed "terrorist groups."

However, government loyalists on social media said the explosions were an Israeli strike believed to have killed Lebanese militant Samir Kuntar, who is reviled in Israel for a 1979 attack that killed four people.

Israel released Kuntar in 2008 as part of a prisoner swap with the Lebanese Shi'ite Hezbollah group.

Some Syrian government loyalists said he was in the building at the time of the attack but his fate was unclear.

It was not immediately possible to confirm the reports.

Author Hassan Hassan says he hears it is true:

Reliable reports Samir Kuntar was indeed killed in an Israeli attack in Jaramanah, in Damascus, earlier today.
— Hassan Hassan (@hxhassan) December 20, 2015

His brother confirms it:

بعزة وإباء ننعي استشهاد القائد المجاهد #سمير_القنطار ولنا فخر انضمامنا الى قافلة عوائل الشهداء بعد ٣٠ عاما من الصبر في قافلة عوائل الاسرى
— Bassam Alkantar (@balkantar) December 20, 2015

RT does as well:

URGENT:Local media say Hezbollah leader #Kuntar's body found under rubble in Damascus #Syria https://t.co/imWHsvLfMr pic.twitter.com/j3UPxdy3X8
— RT (@RT_com) December 20, 2015

Kuntar was falsely rumored to have been killed before.

If true, Kuntar's death is way overdue. He is known for murdering Danny Haran in front of his daughter Einat and then smashing her head on a rock, killing her. He was released in a prisoner swap.

Mahmoud Abbas was very happy with Kuntar's release and went out if his way to meet Kuntar in Lebanon because child-murderers are heroes for the Palestinian cause.

May he rot in hell.

12/19 Links: The Left's Muslim Replacement Theology for Jews; Elliott Abrams: 2016 Predictions

From Ian:

The Left's Muslim Replacement Theology for Jews

Muslims are the new Jews; time to get rid of the old Jews.
Muslims are the new Jews. You can find this offensive claim repeated everywhere in the media. The Jews, a small ethnic minority of millions that was stateless for thousands of years, are a terrible analogy for a global Muslim population of 1.6 billion and around 50 countries that do not comprise a single ethnicity or race. Comparing the two makes as much sense as comparing the Finns to all of Asia.
The only thing the Muslims and the Jews have ever had in common is that the former conquered, persecuted and enslaved the latter. Any religious similarities are the product of Muslim cultural appropriation of Jewish beliefs and any cultural similarities are the result of Muslim colonization.
Comparing Jews to Muslims makes as much sense as comparing Jews to Nazis. But the media began making the argument that the Jews are the new Nazis from the very moment that the stateless Jews got their first state since Rome and its allied Arab invaders had destroyed the last one.
In this twisted historical revisionism, the Jews, a beleaguered minority hanging on to a country slightly bigger than Fiji, who have spent the last 40 years cutting pieces off their small slice of the world to hand over to the region’s massive Muslim majority in the hopes of being left alone, are the new Nazis.

Gil Troy: Fair and balanced

A pro-Israel activist was invited recently to teach teens about Israel at a “liberal” – non-Orthodox – synagogue. Good educators know the importance of building a tent big enough politically to welcome a range of perspectives without reducing Israel to a political problem or politicizing the basic facts so many students don’t know. The challenge grew when the rabbi intervened, saying: “I expect you to present BDS fairly.”
“What,” this activist asked me, “should I do?” We knew what the rabbi meant. In this age of delegitimization, this Jewish leader wanted to make the case for boycotting Israel to the synagogue’s teens, presenting Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions as a fair, legitimate option.
It’s astonishing. If gays, feminists and African-Americans don’t invite homophobes, sexists and racists to present their enemies “fairly,” why should we? This was not even a request to present the Palestinian side – which has educational value – but to justify the boycotters, rooted in anti-Semitism, championing anti-Zionism, often demanding Israel’s destruction.
We need to understand how we stumbled into this pathetic state, wherein Jewish leaders urge us to disrespect ourselves and our story.
It starts with the loony Left’s identity politics and anti-“racism” obsession. Identity politics’ essentialist approach reduces people to their skin colors and ethnicities while labeling them “privileged” or “oppressed.” The privileged are automatically racist, even when biological differences are irrelevant. The oppressed are always right, even when they are violent or wrong.

Elliott Abrams: Predictions for 2016

The survey results are worth noting on several counts. Eight of the top eleven items revolve around troubles in the Middle East, including the top item: Syria. Problems in Egypt, Libya, and Turkey rose from moderate to high priorities. But I am struck by the second and third items, which concern the United States: fears of a terrorist or cyber attack on the homeland.
Here are the top items of concern:
• the intensification of the civil war in Syria;
• a mass casualty attack on the U.S. homeland or a treaty ally;
• a highly disruptive cyberattack on critical U.S. infrastructure;
• a severe crisis with or in North Korea;
• political instability in EU countries stemming from the influx of refugees and migrants;
• continued political fracturing of Libya;
• heightened tensions between Israelis and Palestinians;
• intensified political violence in Turkey;
• increased political instability in Egypt;
• increased violence and instability in Afghanistan; and
• continued fracturing of Iraq due to territorial gains by the self-proclaimed Islamic State and ongoing Sunni-Shia sectarian violence.
Take a look at the entire text. Not exactly Christmas cheer, but as always the survey concentrates the mind on what we are likely to face very soon.

From Al Arabiya:

A United Nations team of war crimes investigators will not probe air strikes by foreign countries in Syria, its chairman said on Wednesday, despite concerns that some attacks by foreign militaries could have violated the laws of war.

The U.N. Commission of Inquiry on Syria is not intended to investigate air strikes in Syria by foreign nations, Chairman Paulo Pinheiro said.

“It is not our mandate to investigate the behavior of powers involved in the crisis of Syria,” Pinheiro told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in a telephone interview.

It would not probe potential cases of violations of international human rights law involving nations conducting military strikes in Syria, he said.

“There is no possibility that we will investigate the American air strikes or French or British or Russian,” he said.

The decision reflected a desire not to meddle into the affairs of powers outside Syria as well as limited means at the group’s disposal, Pinheiro added.

Some observers have cited instances that disproportionately hit civilians and civil infrastructure, and Pinheiro and his three co-commissioners have repeatedly cautioned powers to follow the laws of war.

"Besides," UN officials would have loved to add, "we all know that there is only one Western nation that we hold to any standards whatsoever. And even when that nation exceeds all standards that we set for ourselves, we find them guilty anyway!"

I love the "limited means" argument. The UN holds meetings practically every week all over the world to denounce Israel (we mentioned one in Jakarta last week), it has multiple committees and groups dedicated to nothing else but demonizing Israel, yet they can't scrape the money together to investigate any other nations that are far worse in their wartime activities. Funny, that.

(h/t Gilbert)

12/18 Links Pt2: Celebrating Israel; Anti-Semites Unwittingly Aid Israel; UN recognizes Yom Kippur

From Ian:

JPost Editorial: Celebrating Israel

There is no shortage of negative news about Israel; Every once in a while we Israelis should remember there is much for which to be proud.
In large part due to slanted media reports, propaganda and downright lies, impressions of Israel worldwide tend to be negative – particularly among those who have never visited the country.
But according to the UN Human Development Index released this week, things in the Jewish state are not so bad. In fact, they are pretty good.
The index, which takes into consideration income, life expectancy and education for a combined development score, ranks Israel 18 out of 188 countries in human development. Not only did Israel’s score surpass by far all of its neighbors (Qatar is the highest ranked Arab state at No. 32; Saudi Arabia, 36; Lebanon 67; Jordan 80; Egypt, 108; and war-torn Syria at 134), but it outscored the EU and OECD averages as well. Countries such as France, Spain, Italy and even Japan scored lower than Israel. Sub-Saharan Africa scored the lowest.
A number of factors come together to give Israel one of the highest scores in the world. For instance, Israel has the second lowest rate of maternal mortality in the world with just two deaths for every 100,000 births. And at 2.9 births per woman, the Jewish state manages to maintain such a low mortality rate while having the highest fertility rate of any country in the “Very High Human Development” category (those countries ranked in the top 49). For the sake of comparison, the US has 28 maternal deaths per 100,000 births at a two-birthsper- woman average.

Anti-Semites Unwittingly Aid Israel

I admit to getting a kick out of seeing anti-Semites inadvertently help the very Jewish state they dream of destroying. And it happens more often than you might think, as was driven home by three very different news reports this week.
The first is that some 8,000 French Jews moved to Israel this year, topping last year’s all-time high of 7,000. Immigration is always good for Israel. Not only does each group of immigrants bring its own ideas and strengths that contribute to making Israel a better place, but the country simply needs a critical mass of people to survive as a Jewish state in an Arab region. Indeed, had it not been for the millions of Jews who immigrated since 1948, Israel might not have survived.
Most immigrants to Israel are Zionists; they genuinely care about the Jewish state. But even so, most of them wouldn’t have left comfortable lives elsewhere had there not been a push factor as well as a pull factor; that’s why most American Zionists still don’t come. And usually, anti-Semitism has been part of that push factor, just as it is for French Jews today.
So thank you, anti-Semites, for turning a country of 800,000 people into one eight million strong. It would never have happened without your help.

Book explodes myth of Moroccan coexistence

It is a sorry sign of how intolerant of minorities were the theologians of the al-Maliki school of Islam in the Maghreb until the colonial era, that the first thing they published when the printing press came to Morocco in the 19th century, was not a scientific tract, or even the Koran, but the Epistle against the Jews which al-Maghili wrote to the chieftains of Touat five centuries earlier.
Maghreb theologians preserved a strict interpretation of the dhimmi laws which governed the relationship of Jews and Muslims under the 8th century Pact of Omar. The prophet Muhammad had spared the lives of the defeated Jews and Christians as 'People of the Book', rather than put them to the sword, but they had to abide by rules denoting their subjugation and inferiority to Muslims.
Following codification in the 13th century by the literalist theologian Ibn Taymiyya, 'Dhimmi' acquired a precise meaning in Islamic jurisprudence: non-Muslims would be 'protected' by Muslims in return for a capitation or poll tax. This begs the question - protected against whom?
Violent mobs singled out the Jewish 'Other' for attack and looting. Jews would 'cop it' at times of political turmoil or trouble.
Jews could not build new synagogues or repair them without permission; they had to allow Muslims to enter them at will. Jewish homes had sometimes to be painted red or blue, even after Jews had been permitted in modern times to move out of the Jewish mellah into the medina.
Jews were forbidden from teaching their children the Koran. This was to prevent Jews engaging in theological polemics with Muslims.
Jews had to wear special badges and black attire. A Jew's djellaba was worn awkwardly 'off the shoulder' for maximum discomfort. Jews were not permitted to blow the ram's horn (shofar) in a public place. The Palestinian Mufti of Jerusalem would use this pretext to incite anti-Jewish riots in 1929.

Dr. Wassim El-Sisi, at Egyptologist, says that God's chosen people are not Jews but the Egyptian people.

Jewish claims to be chosen are simply propaganda, he says.

Sisi says that the prophet Idris appeared and declared this thousands of years before Moses.

Idris is a prophet mentioned in the Koran as the second prophet in history, after Adam. He is identified with Enoch. In the Koran he indeed visits Egypt and the Nile.

Sisi also said that the Egyptian people were respectful of women, unlike the Jews who consider women unclean. In addition, he says that modern research confirms that Egyptian genes are present in all races in the world.

You can learn amazing things from Arabic media.

If any part of the PA budget is sacred, it is the part that pays the salaries of terrorists in Israeli prison, former prisoners, and their families. Some 6% of the PA's budget goes towards rewarding terror.

So this story, which did not get any publicity in English, is most interesting.

A few dozen former prisoners protested that their salaries were cut by the PA. According to the article, some 70 terrorists have been cut off from the Western-funded gravy train of welfare for terrorists.

According to reports, the reason is because they are members of Hamas who refuse to accept the legitimacy of the Fatah-led PA government.

The PA's official response was that these protesters were criminals (I'm not sure if they mean that they violated Palestinian law or if they were jailed in Israel for criminal, not terrorist, activities.)

The protesters denied that they were criminals and said "all the prisoners whose salaries have been cut are honorable people of this country who spent the prime of their youth in Israeli jails, in defense of the Palestinian cause."

The protesters threatened a hunger strike if their demands aren't met.

The article helpfully confirms that "According to Palestinian law, any prisoner who has spent time in Israeli jails for more than 5 years has the right to a salary and he is assured of a job."

And the world wants to give legitimacy to a state that by law hires terrorists for do-nothing jobs. The word "corruption" doesn't describe this because it is not being hidden at all - they are proud of it.

(h/t Yenta)

12/18 Links Pt1: Col. Kemp: Why we put our reputations on the line; Why Syria Can’t Be Fixed

From Ian:

Caroline Glick: Rubio, Cruz and US Global Leadership

At some point between 2006 and 2008, the American people decided to turn their backs on the world. Between the seeming futility of the war in Iraq and the financial collapse of 2008, Americans decided they’d had enough.
In Barack Obama, they found a leader who could channel their frustration. Obama’s foreign policy, based on denying the existence of radical Islam and projecting the responsibility for Islamic aggression on the US and its allies, suited their mood just fine. If America is responsible, then America can walk away. Once it is gone, so the thinking has gone, the Muslims will forget their anger and leave America alone.
Sadly, Obama’s foreign policy assumptions are utter nonsense. America’s abandonment of global leadership has not made things better. Over the past seven years, the legions of radical Islam have expanded and grown more powerful than ever before. And now in the aftermath of the jihadist massacres in Paris and San Bernadino, the threats have grown so abundant that even Obama cannot pretend them away.
As a consequence, for the first time in a decade, Americans are beginning to think seriously about foreign policy. But are they too late? Can the next president repair the damage Obama has caused? The Democrats give no cause for optimism. Led by former secretary of state Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential hopefuls stubbornly insist that there is nothing wrong with Obama’s foreign policy. If they are elected to succeed him, they pledge to follow in his footsteps.

Col. Richard Kemp: We put our reputations on the line. This is why

The High Level Military Group’s (HLMG) findings on the 2014 Gaza conflict were the diametric opposite of those of the UN Human Rights Council, human rights groups and the majority of Western media, all of whom believe Israel used disproportionate force and committed war crimes. Why?
Because, unlike the HLMG, these organisations lack any credible military expertise. This is a problem when you are assessing a military conflict. They also mostly hit this issue from a pre-determined position that they want to be right: Israel is the neighbourhood bully and Hamas are the hapless representatives of a bullied, down-trodden population. And they analyse the situation based on human rights law, not the laws of armed conflict. Human rights law is fine if you are dealing with a police arrest on the streets of London, but not when you’re looking at large-scale violent armed exchanges between warring factions – that is what the Geneva conventions are intended to regulate.
The upshot of this ignorant, distorted, malign and misjudged perspective is the widespread demonisation of the state of Israel. That, of course, is what Israel’s enemies, who have manipulated the UN, human rights groups and much of the media as well as many world governments, always intended.
If you are taken in by it, and you yourself condemn the Jewish state on the basis of what these organisations tell you, which to be fair is pretty much all you ever hear, then you too are an instrument of Israel’s enemies. If you are Jewish and you condemn Israel on the basis of this disinformation, then you are a doubly valuable enemy instrument. You are like Lord Haw-Haw was to the Germans during the Second World War: a valuable Brit (well, a US-born Irishman to be precise) who used Nazi propaganda against the UK.

Israeli Columnist Applauded at Haaretz Conference for Calling Aliyah a Crime

A veteran Haaretz columnist was applauded at the Israeli daily’s conference this week in New York, after calling Jewish immigration to Israel (aliyah) a crime, the Israeli news site nrg reported on Thursday.
Amira Hass made the comment while moderating a panel on “struggles for equality” in Israel. The long-time publicist, who is known for her extreme left-wing views, pointed to the fact that, unlike an American Jew, an American of Palestinian origin wishing to immigrate to Israel would not be granted citizenship.
“Because of that, any [Jewish] individual who is planning to make aliyah should know that he is about to commit a crime,” Hass said, eliciting applause from the largely Jewish audience and no counter-argument from panel participants.
“At any given moment, every American Jew has rights in Israel that are denied to Palestinians,” she continued, claiming that while American Jews can visit, work or live anywhere in the country at any time, some Palestinians born in Israel don’t have those same rights.

US supports Saudi book fair that sells antisemitic literature

The Saudi Press Agency reports:

Jeddah, Rabi'I 01, 1437, December 12, 2015, SPA -- US Consul General in Jeddah Todd Holmstrom praised [the] Jeddah International Book Fair, which represents an opportunity to celebrate reading as an essential part of life.

He made the remarks during his visit today to the exhibition.

The US official highlighted Saudi-US relations in the field of cultural exchange.

In fact, the US Consulate had a booth at the fair, where they sold books like Harry Potter, The Hunger Games, the Lord of the Rings trilogy, "I am Malala" and Barack Obama's autobiography along with a biography of the First Lady.

The ADL highlighted some other books at the fair:

The Jeddah International Book Fair in Saudi Arabia, which hosts more than 350 publishing houses from 21 countries, appears to feature anti-Semitic books for sale.

The book fair, taking place December 12–22, includes on its “Book Lists” works such as My Awakening: The Jewish Influence in the United States by the notorious anti-Semite David Duke. Duke’s book, classified as “Political Science” on the list from the Dar Alfiker Al Mua’sir publishing house in Lebanon, is listed for SAR53 (US$14).

Adolph Hitler’s Mein Kampf, which served as a blueprint for the extermination of six million Jews and millions of others in the Holocaust, is listed to be sold at the book fair for SAR45 (US$12). Classified as “History,” Mein Kampf, is on the list from Ibn Al Nafees publishing house in Egypt. A book titled Free Masons, The Jews and The Torahby Dr. Noman Al Samarayi, which promotes conspiratorial theories about a Jewish role in dominating the world, was listed for sale for SR8 (US$2).

This is only the tip of the iceberg.

I found books with titles like Psychological Study of the Jewish Faith with determines exactly why Jews are so racist, and the Jewish Sedition of History - and they were just from one exhibitor.

So why is the US supporting this book fair?

(h/t Shawarma News)

Two weeks ago I asked readers to write to organizations known to have funded the Palestinian Commission for Refugees (sometimes called the Palestinian Commission for Refugees Rights Protection or PCRP) and ask about their apparent support for its head, Dr Gamal Abdel Nasser Mohammed Abu Nahel, who is a prolific author of virulent Jew-hatred, whose articles are linked to from the PCRP Facebook page.

I predicted that these organizations would distance themselves from Dr. Nahel rather than use their positions of influence to pressure the organization to fire him. And I was right.

The National Endowment for Democracy was the first to respond by saying that they have not funded the organization for several years.

Now, USAID has issued a similar response to several of my readers:

Thank you for your recent inquiry to the US Agency for International Development.

USAID does not currently fund the Palestinian Commission for Refugees (PCR). The organization last received funding from USAID in 2009-2010 to conduct community outreach in Gaza on women’s legal rights, through the USAID NETHAM Rule of Law Program, which ended in 2010.

PCR was subject to thorough anti-terrorism vetting prior to receiving funding from USAID, including the vetting of all board members. The statements in question were made by an individual who was not affiliated with PCR during the period that USAID funded the organization.

USAID is committed to supporting a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, leading to the emergence of two states living side-by-side in peace and security.

Regards,
Michael Collins

_____________________________________________

Michael Collins | Public Affairs & Outreach Team LeadMiddle East Bureau | US Agency for International DevelopmentRRB 4.10-084 | 1300 Pennsylvania Ave NW, Washington DC, 20523 USAmcollins@usaid.gov @USAIDMiddleEast

And again, I encourage my reader to write back to USAID and tell them that while it is very nice that they have nothing to do with Dr. Nahel, they have an opportunity to pro-actively do something about endemic Arab antisemitism rather than wash their hands of the matter. By telling PCRP that they will never receive funding again as long as Dr. Nahel is leading the organization - and that this information will be shared with other funders of Palestinian NGOs - they can do a great deal of good without spending a dime.

The articles I linked to have been removed from the PCRP's Facebook page, so clearly one of the funders made a phone call and PCRP responded by slightly dissociating itself from the antisemitism of its leader. (Or Facebook responded to a complaint, but I doubt that.) NGOs are far more motivated by the fear of losing funding than anything else. The funders of NGOs from democratic countries have an obligation to use their influence to root out the hate, not just to fund a program here or there that might help women or children.

I have not heard anything back yet from the Anna Lindh Foundation or the UN Development Program who also partner with PCRP, and whose partnership appears to be ongoing.