'Massive planned invasion' storms channel tunnel as 'migrants' seek to enter Britain - Thomas Lifson

by Thomas Lifson

Not content with Germany, the invaders move on Britain and block the Channel Tunnel for hours in a highly organized invasion.

The tunnel connecting Britain and France was closed to train traffic for up to 6 hours, as hundreds of "migrants" engaged in a planned assault to use it to enter the U.K.  The Daily Express reports:

Eurotunnel services between Folkestone and Calais have been suspended until at least 10am in both directions – with passengers facing delays of up to six hours.
Officials believe the "large and co-ordinated" group planned the intrusion before attempting to reach Britain at around 12.30am on Saturday.
A Eurotunnel sokesman said: "It's a massive invasion and intrusion by a very large and co-ordinated group of migrants.

One has to wonder why they prefer Britain to Germany, with its official welcome and lavish welfare benefits.  Is there another agenda at work?

Muslims have invaded Europe twice before, being stopped at Tours by Charles Martel in 732...

...and 951 years, later history repeated itself as bloody tragedy at the gates of Vienna in 1683.

Now, a mere 332 years later, a third wave comes, not as conquerors (yet), but as mendicants. 

As Karl Marx predicated, history repeats itself a second time as farce.  As experience shows, once the Muslim population of a district reaches a near majority, sharia law starts being enforced, violently when necessary, and no-go zones proliferate.  It is farcical to allow this to happen.

Hat tip: Clarice Feldman

Thomas Lifson

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/10/massive_planned_invasion_storms_channel_tunnel_as_migrants_seek_to_enter_britain.html

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Abbas's Trap: The Big Bluff - Khaled Abu Toameh

by Khaled Abu Toameh

• Those who rushed to declare the death of the Oslo Accords fell into Abbas's trap.
• Abbas's threats are mainly designed to scare the international community into pressuring Israel to offer Abbas more concessions. He is hoping that inaccurate headlines concerning the purported abrogation of the Oslo Accords will cause panic in Washington and European capitals, prompting world leaders to demand that Israel give Abbas everything he asks for.
• Abbas knows that cancelling the agreements with Israel would mean dissolving his Palestinian Authority, and the end of his political career.
• The tens of thousands of Arab refugees now seeking asylum in Europe could not care less about the "occupation" and settlements.
• Ironically, Abbas declared that, "We are working on spreading the culture of peace and coexistence between our people and in our region." But his harsh words against Israel, in addition to continued anti-Israel incitement in the Palestinian media, prove that he is moving in the opposite direction. This form of incitement destroys any chance of peace.

After weeks of threatening to drop a bombshell during his speech before the UN General Assembly, Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas on September 30 proved once again that he is an expert in the art of bluffing.

In the end, the bombshell he and his aides promised to detonate at the UN turned out to be a collection of old threats to abrogate signed agreements and a smear campaign against Israel.

There was nothing dramatic or new in Abbas's speech. During the past few years, he and some of his aides have been openly talking about the possibility of cancelling the Oslo Accords if Israel does not fulfill its obligations towards the peace process.

In his speech, Abbas repeated the same threat, although some Western political analysts and journalists misinterpreted it as an announcement that he was abrogating signed agreements with Israel.

As one of Abbas's advisors, Mahmoud Habbash, later clarified, "President Abbas did not cancel any agreements. He only made a threat, which is not going to be carried out tomorrow."

Now, it is obvious that the talk about a bombshell was mainly intended to create tension and suspense ahead of Abbas's speech. This is a practice that Abbas and his aides have become accustomed to using during the past few years in order to draw as much attention as possible.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas addresses the UN General Assembly, on September 26, 2014. (Image source: UN)

The threat to cancel the Oslo Accords with Israel is not different from other threats that Abbas and his aides have made over the past few years. How many times has Abbas threatened in the past to resign from his post or suspend security coordination with Israel? In the end, he did not carry out any of these threats.

Abbas is unlikely, also this time, to carry out his latest threat to cancel the agreements with Israel. He knows that such a move would mean dissolving his Palestinian Authority and the end of his political career. But Abbas would like the world to believe that he has already cancelled the Oslo Accords. Judging from the inaccurate headlines in the international media, he seems to have achieved his goal.

Now, many in the international community are falsely convinced that Abbas has annulled all signed agreements with Israel. Those who rushed to declare the death of the Oslo Accords fell into Abbas's trap.

Abbas's threats are mainly designed to scare the international community into pressuring Israel to offer Abbas more concessions. He is hoping that the inaccurate headlines concerning the purported abrogation of the Oslo Accords will cause panic in Washington and European capitals, prompting world leaders to demand that Israel give Abbas everything he is asking for.

Abbas is also hoping that his recurring threats will put the Israeli-Palestinian conflict back at the world's center stage. Abbas and the Palestinians feel that the world has lost interest in the conflict, largely due to the ongoing turmoil in the Arab world, the refugee crisis in Europe and the growing threat of the Islamic State terror group.

This concern was voiced by the PLO's Saeb Erekat immediately after President Barack Obama's speech at the UN General Assembly, which did not include any reference to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Expressing "disappointment" over Obama's speech, Erekat asked, "Does President Obama believe he can defeat ISIS and terrorism, or achieve security and stability in the Middle East, by ignoring the continued Israeli occupation, settlement expansion and the continued attacks on al-Aqsa Mosque?"

Of course, there is no direct link between Israeli "occupation" and settlements and the growing threat of radical Islam or the turmoil in the Arab world. The Islamic State is not beheading Muslims and non-Muslims because of the settlements or "occupation." The Islamic State is not committing all these atrocities because it wants to "liberate Palestine." Its main objective is to conquer the world after killing all the "infidels" in order to establish a sharia-ruled caliphate. The Islamic State would kill Erekat and Abbas -- and many other Muslims -- on its way to achieve its goal. In the eyes of the Islamic State, folks like Erekat and Abbas are a fifth column and traitors.

But instead of supporting the world's war against the Islamic State and radical Islam, Abbas and Erekat want the international community to look the other way and devote all its energies and attention to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The tens of thousands of Arab refugees who are now seeking asylum in several European countries could not care less about the "occupation" and settlements. These people have lost everything they used to possess and their only dream is to either return to their homes and lands safely or start a new life in Europe and the US.

Abbas wanted worldwide attention in wake of the international community's preoccupation with the refugee crisis and the radical Islam threat. For now, he appears to have achieved his goal, largely thanks to the international community's misreading of his speech at the United Nations.

But while everyone is busy talking about Abbas's bombshell, only a few have noticed that his speech consisted mostly of anti-Israel rhetoric that is likely to aggravate tensions between the Palestinians and Israel. Abbas used the UN General Assembly podium to make grave charges against Israel concerning "apartheid," settlements and tensions on the Temple Mount. His fiery rhetoric, which has been partially welcomed by Hamas and other radical Palestinian groups, is likely to exacerbate tensions between Israelis and Palestinians and encourage more Palestinians to engage in violence.

It is this form of incitement that destroys any chance of peace between Israel and the Palestinians. This is the kind of rhetoric that prompts Palestinian youths to take to the streets and throw rocks and firebombs at Israeli civilians and policemen. Still, the international media, by and large, chose to ignore this destructive part of Abbas's speech.

Ironically, Abbas declared in his speech that, "We are working on spreading the culture of peace and coexistence between our people and in our region." But his harsh words against Israel, in addition to continued anti-Israel incitement in the Palestinian media, prove that he is moving in the opposite direction. As Abbas was addressing the UN General Assembly, some of his loyalists in Ramallah threatened and expelled Israeli Jewish journalists who came to interview Palestinians. This is certainly not a way to spread a "culture of peace and coexistence."

• Follow Khaled Abu Toameh on Twitter

Khaled Abu Toameh

Source: http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/6620/abbas-bluff

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Israel’s Risk Aversion Problem - Caroline Glick

by Caroline Glick

How the Jewish State is being lured into strategic paralysis that imperils its future.

Originally published by the Jerusalem Post. 

On Wednesday the Obama administration was caught off guard by Russia’s rapid rise in Syria. As the Russians began bombing a US-supported militia along the Damascus-Homs highway, Secretary of State John Kerry was meeting with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, at the UN. Just hours before their meeting Kerry was insisting that Russia’s presence in Syria would likely be a positive development.
Reacting to the administration’s humiliation, Republican Sen. John McCain said, “This administration has confused our friends, encouraged our enemies, mistaken an excess of caution for prudence and replaced the risks of action with the perils of inaction.”
McCain added that Russian President Vladimir Putin had stepped “into the wreckage of this administration’s Middle East policy.”
While directed at the administration, McCain’s general point is universally applicable. Today is no time for an overabundance of caution.
The system of centralized regimes that held sway in the Arab world since the breakup of the Ottoman Empire nearly a century ago has unraveled. The shape of the new order has yet to be determined.
The war in Syria and the chaos and instability engulfing the region are part and parcel of the birth pangs of a new regional governing architecture now taking form. Actions taken by regional and global actors today will likely will influence power relations for generations.
Putin understands the opportunity of the moment.
He views the decomposition of Syria as an opportunity to rebuild Russia’s power and influence in the Middle East – at America’s expense.
Russia isn’t the only strategic player seeking to exploit the war in Syria and the regional chaos. Turkey and Iran are also working assiduously to take advantage of the current absence of order to advance their long term interests.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is exploiting the rise of Islamic State in Syria and Iraq to fight the Kurds in both countries. Erdogan’s goal is twofold: to prevent the establishment of an independent Kurdistan and to disenfranchise the Kurds in Turkey.
As for Iran, Syria is Iran’s bulwark against Sunni power in the Arab world and the logistical base for Tehran’s Shi’ite foreign legion Hezbollah. Iranian dictator Ali Khamenei is willing to fight to the bitter end to hold as much of Syrian territory as possible.
Broadly speaking, Iran views the breakup of the Arab state system as both a threat and an opportunity.
The chaos threatens Iran, because it has radicalized the Sunni world. If Sunni forces unite, their numeric advantage against Shi’ite Iran will imperil it.
The power of Sunni numbers is the reason Bashar Assad now controls a mere sixth of Syrian territory. To prevent his fate from befalling them, the Iranians seek to destabilize neighboring regimes and where possible install proxy governments in their stead.
Iran’s cultivation of alliances and proxy relationships with Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood and al-Qaida, and its phony war against Islamic State all point to an overarching goal of keeping Sunni forces separated and dependent on Tehran.
The Iranian regime also fears the prospect of being overthrown by its domestic opponents. To counter this threat the regime engages in large-scale and ever escalating repression of its perceived foes.
Iran’s nuclear program also plays a key role in the regime’s survival strategy. As Khamenei and his underlings see things, nuclear weapons protect the regime in three ways. They deter Iran’s external foes. They increase domestic support for the regime by enriching Iran which, no longer under international sanctions, sees its diplomatic and economic prestige massively enhanced due to its nuclear program.
Finally, there is Iran’s war with Israel and the US. A nuclear-armed Iran is a direct threat to both countries.
And this, too, is a boon for the mullacracy. From the regime’s perspective, fighting Israel and the US serves to neutralize the Sunni threat to the regime. The more Iran is seen as fighting Israel and the US the more legitimate it appears to Sunni jihadists.
This then brings us to the Americans. Like the Russians, the Turks and the Iranians, President Barack Obama and his associates are strategic players. Unlike those powers however, the administration is moved not by raw power calculations but by ideological dictates.
Obama and his advisers are convinced that the instability and radicalization of states and actors throughout the region is the consequence of the actions of past US administrations and those of America’s regional allies – first and foremost, Israel and Egypt. The basis for this conviction is the administration’s post-colonial ideological underpinnings.
Because his strategy is based on ideological beliefs rather than power calculations rooted in reality, Obama’s position cannot be swayed by evidence, even when evidence shows that his administration’s policies endanger US national security.
This brings us to Israel.
Israel has limited power to influence regional events.
It cannot change its neighbors’ values or cultures. Israel can however limit its neighbors’ ability to harm it and expand its ability to deter would be aggressors by among other things, using its power judiciously to influence now forming power balances between various regional and world actors.
Israel has followed this model in Syria with notable success.
At an early stage of the war our leaders recognized that aside from the Kurds, who have no shared border with us, there are no viable actors in Syria that are not dangerous to Israel. As a result, Israel has no interest in the victory of one group against others.
The only actor in Syria that Israel has felt it necessary to actively rein in is Hezbollah. So it has acted repeatedly to prevent Hezbollah from using its operational presence in Syria as a means for augmenting its offensive capabilities in Lebanon.
The problem with this strategy is that it has ignored the fact that from Hezbollah’s perspective, there is no operational difference between Lebanon and Syria.
The war in Syria spread to Lebanon years ago.
Now, with Iranian and Russian assistance, Hezbollah is beginning to develop the industrial capacity to bypass Israel and independently produce advanced weapons inside Lebanon. This rapid industrialization of Hezbollah’s military capabilities requires Israel to end its respect for the all-but-destroyed international border and take direct action against Hezbollah’s capabilities in Lebanon.
This brings us to Hezbollah’s boss, Iran. For the past several years, the same caution that has led Israel to grant de facto immunity to Hezbollah forces in Lebanon has led to Israel’s passivity and deference to the Obama administration in relation to Iran’s nuclear program.
With regard to Iran’s nuclear installations, the strategy of passivity has largely been forced onto an unwilling political leadership by Israel’s military leaders.
For the past several years, the IDF’s General Staff has refused to support the government’s position on Iran’s nuclear program.
Our military leaders have justified their insubordination by arguing that if Israel takes independent action against Iran’s nuclear program it will undermine its bilateral relations with the US, which they consider more important than preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
Although under the best of circumstances, the IDF’s position would be unacceptable from the perspective of democratic norms of governance, since the ideologically driven Obama administration took power seven years ago, the military’s position has imperiled the country.
So long as Obama – or the ideology that informs his actions – remains in power in Washington, US security guarantees towards Israel will have no credibility.
The IDF’s assessment that ties to the US are more important than preventing Iran from becoming a nuclear power will remain incorrect, and dangerously so.
Today is Israel’s opportunity to shape the future of the Middle East by not only preventing Iran from becoming a nuclear power, but by preventing a regional nuclear arms race.
The closer Iran comes to emerging as a nuclear power, the more Sunni regimes, including Islamic State, will seek their own nuclear capabilities. It goes without saying that the more regional actors have nuclear weapons, the more dangerous the region becomes for Israel, and indeed for the world as a whole.
For many Israelis, the story of the week wasn’t Russia’s air strikes against US-allied forces in Syria. It was PLO chief and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s speech at the UN General Assembly.
Leftists expressed horror in the face of Abbas’s threat to end the PLO’s adherence to the agreements it signed with Israel in the 1990s (and has stood in material breach of ever since). The government insisted, for its part that the reason the peace process has not brought peace is because Abbas and his PLO refuse to negotiate with Israel.
Unfortunately, both sides’ responses to Abbas’s speech indicate that Israel has lost all semblance of strategic purpose in regard to the Palestinians.
Fifteen years ago this week, on September 28, 2000, the Palestinians opened their terrorist war against Israel. Ever since it has been clear that no Palestinian faction is interested in living at peace with Israel.
Despite this, for the past 15 years, Israel has refused to reconsider its strategic allegiance to the false notion that it has the ability to influence the hearts and minds of the Palestinians and bend them in the direction of peace.
This delusional thinking is what caused the IDF’s General Staff to convene immediately after Operation Protective Edge ended and try to figure out how to rebuild Gaza.
Ever since the cease-fire came into force, Hamas has diverted all the assistance it has received from Israel and the international community not to rebuild Gaza, but to rebuild its military capacity to harm Israel. And yet, from the IDF’s perspective, ever since the war ended our most urgent task has been to save Hamas and the Palestinians alike from reckoning with the price of their aggression.
Likewise, Israel continues to insist that we have a strategic interest in peace with the PLO. Even if this is true in theory, chances are greater that unicorns will fall from the sky and prance through Jerusalem’s Old City than that the PLO will agree to make peace with Israel.
Our continued defense of the PLO as a legitimate actor harms our ability to secure other strategic interests that are achievable and can improve Israel’s regional position. These interests include securing transportation arteries in Judea and Samaria and strengthening Israel's military and political control over the areas. These interests have only grown more acute in recent years with the rise of jihadist forces throughout the region and among the Palestinians themselves.
This brings us back to McCain and his strategic wisdom.
Israel must not allow the risks of action to lure us into strategic paralysis that imperils our future.
The more Israel allows other actors to determine the nature of the emerging regional order, the less secure Israel will be. The more willing we are to take calculated risks today the greater our ability will be to influence the future architecture of regional power relations and so minimize threats to our survival in the decades to come.


Caroline Glick is the Director of the David Horowitz Freedom Center's Israel Security Project and the Senior Contributing Editor of The Jerusalem Post. For more information on Ms. Glick's work, visit carolineglick.com.

Source: http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/260328/israels-risk-aversion-problem-caroline-glick

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Syria: One mistake after another - Reuven Berko

by Reuven Berko

The growing Russian presence in Syria and the fact that Assad is still in power are direct byproducts of American inaction • But Putin's cooperation with Iran, which has aspirations to send troops to the Golan, could potentially get Russia into trouble.

 

The site of a Russian airstrike in Syria, this week. | Photo credit: AFP

Several days ago, a council of Islamic sages -- representing the Sunnis -- protested against a recent deal between the United States, Iran, Russia and Iraq's Shiite government. This deal aims to preserve Iran's influence in Iraq and divide Syria into regions of influence where Iran will establish a foothold while preserving Syrian President Bashar Assad's rule. The council has good reason to oppose this deal. The council represents the Sunni segment of Iraq's population -- the victims of Iran's takeover of Iraq's administration and some of its territory as a result of the American withdrawal.

Instead of rebuilding Saddam Hussein's army, the Americans established -- at enormous cost -- a defeatist, lackadaisical Iraqi army and a "democratic" puppet government that is propped up by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. That is how they rewarded the Iranians, who shout "Death to America," who plan and fund terror attacks against the U.S. and who forced the U.S. to withdraw from Iraq. Iran then took over Iraq and thus began a wave of persecution and oppression against its Sunni inhabitants.

Rallying around loyalists from Saddam Hussein's army, Iraq's Sunnis began a campaign of revenge attacks against the Iranians. This group currently serves as the backbone of the Islamic State group. It strikes at Iran's operatives in Iraq and at Assad's troops and their collaborators from Hezbollah in Syria, and sows death in various places around the world as well.

The Americans' misguided policy of rewarding Iran, which they see as a "subcontractor" in the war against Islamic State's terrorism, has generated an absurd situation: While the U.S. and its Western allies bombard Islamic State in coordination with their adversary Iran, U.S. allies in the Persian Gulf -- Saudi Arabia and Qatar, and even Turkey, which is a member of NATO -- back their Sunni Islamic State brothers, considered to be the only force capable of stopping Iran.

The Americans are well aware of Iran's efforts to take over the northern axis -- Tehran, Baghdad, Damascus and Beirut -- in order to use Hezbollah against Israel. They are also aware of the Iranians' threats against Saudi Arabia and their subversive activity against its allies in the Gulf on the southern axis -- in the Strait of Hormuz, Yemen, Bab el-Mandeb and Bahrain -- following their takeover of the strategic Abu Musa island in the Persian Gulf.

An obstacle to Sunni territorial contiguity

The reasons behind the U.S.'s mistakes in the Middle East, which have caused regimes to collapse and sparked a regional deterioration, are a mystery. One approach, which attributes the damage to American naiveté and ignorance, has gained traction recently, after it emerged that moderate rebels in Syria sold weapons they received from the Americans to none other than Islamic State. It was also American mistakes that ended up flooding the Middle East with millions of refugees -- and restoring Russia's status as a superpower in the Middle East and in Europe.

There is no doubt that the growing Russian presence in Syria and their support for Assad, the murderer of his own people, are a direct byproduct of American inaction, which failed to remove Assad from power. Arab statesmen say that Russian President Vladimir Putin's increasing strength in Syria is part of a future package deal with the Americans -- a deal that will whitewash Putin's takeover of the Crimean peninsula as he rescues Assad's regime -- which he will then use to leverage his foothold in the Latakia port. 

It is also becoming more evident that in the division of Syria's "carcass" into Iranian spheres of influence, Iran has been rewarded in a way that places Israel in peril. It appears that Iran, not yet satisfied with the terrorism of Hezbollah, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Gaza, Judea and Samaria, is working on creating a direct front with Israel on the Golan Heights.

Unlike Iran's religious motivation, Russia's involvement in the conflict against Islamic State stems from pure military interest, and presents an operative but solvable challenge for the Israeli army. On the other hand, the Russian-Iranian connection is a red flag for the Islamist opposition groups in Syria, which warn that Russia will be defeated just as it was in Afghanistan. This being the case, Iran will not be able to establish itself next to Israel on the Golan Heights without creating conflict with Islamist opposition groups and arousing active resistance in Jordan, the Gulf states and even in Turkey, which secretly cooperated with Iran out of base economic considerations. We should bear in mind that the Turks hope to crush the Kurds and remove Assad, both of which pose an obstacle to the dream of Sunni territorial contiguity from Turkey southward.

A zero-sum war

Should Iran gain U.S. consent-by-silence as a further reward for its "good intentions" and establish itself in the territory bordering the Israeli Golan Heights while it seeks to "liberate Jerusalem," it will prove yet another obstacle for Turkey in addition to Assad and the Russians. Such a development will not put an end to the conflicts in disintegrating Syria. If the Iranians provoke a conflict with Israel, they will find themselves far from home, between the crushing Israeli army and a line of hostile Islamist forces in the Beqaa Valley such as the Nusra Front and Islamic State that will block its access to the Iranian-Iraqi-Shiite territories to the east.

An Iranian presence of this kind will be like a finger on the trigger of a direct conflict with Israel. The instigation of such a conflict will be up to Iran and Hezbollah, which refuse to countenance any agreement with Israel. An Iranian presence along the length of the Golan Heights alongside Assad's troops and Hezbollah on the Lebanese border will create a menacing military contiguity (similar to what the Iraqis did in 1973).

But this time, a conflict with Israel will get the Russians into trouble as well. It will also put the Americans, who are partners in alliances with the Arab states and with Israel, into a situation of direct conflict -- and accelerate the flight of millions more Syrians and Lebanese from their homes to Europe.

But there are also a few bright spots for Israel in the bleak Middle Eastern mire, such as reduced likelihood that Arab states will form a military coalition against us and the minimization of the Palestinian problem. The zero-sum war between the Sunnis and the Shiites has brought forward regional players who oppose Islamic State and Iran, and Israel can use these players' help in resolving the Palestinian problem as millions of refugees are absorbed in Arab states. Assad's survival under Russian and Iranian auspices is better for us than a rule of Islamic State, which, unlike Hamas and Hezbollah who mourn their losses, bear no responsibility toward the Islamic population under their rule, and are therefore undeterrable.

Reuven Berko

Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=28633

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Germany's Sharia Refugee Shelters - Soeren Kern

by Soeren Kern

• Christians, Kurds and Yazidis in the shelters are being attacked by Muslims with increasing frequency and ferocity.
• "I fled from the Iranian secret service because I thought that in Germany I could finally live my faith without persecution. But in the refugee shelter, I cannot admit that I am a Christian, or I would face threats... They treat me like an animal. They threaten to kill me." — An Iranian Christian in a German refugee shelter.
• "We have to dispense with the illusion that all of those who are coming here are human rights activists. ... We are getting reports of threats of aggression, including threats of beheading, by Sunnis against Shiites, but Yazidis and Christians are the most impacted. Those Christian converts who do not hide their faith stand a 100% probability of being attacked and mobbed." — Max Klingberg, director of the Frankfurt-based International Society for Human Rights.
• "We are observing that Salafists are appearing at the shelters disguised as volunteers and helpers, deliberately seeking contact with refugees to invite them to their mosques to recruit them to their cause." — Hans-Georg Maaßen, head of German intelligence.
• Police are urgently calling for migrants of different faiths to be housed in separate facilities. Some politicians counter that such segregation would go against Germany's multicultural values.
• "The bulk of the migrants who are arriving here cannot be integrated." — Heinz Buschkowsky, former mayor of Berlin's Neukölln district.

Muslim asylum seekers are enforcing Islamic Sharia law in German refugee shelters, according to police, who warn that Christians, Kurds and Yazidis in the shelters are being attacked by Muslims with increasing frequency and ferocity.
Muslim migrants from different sects, clans, ethnicities and nationalities are also attacking each other. Violent brawls — sometimes involving hundreds of migrants — are now a daily occurrence.
Police say the shelters, where thousands of migrants are housed together in cramped spaces for months at a time, are seething cauldrons ready to explode. The police are urgently calling for migrants of different faiths to be housed in separate facilities.
Some politicians counter that such segregation would go against Germany's multicultural values, while others say that separating hundreds of thousands of migrants by religion and nationality would be a logistical impossibility.
As the consequences of unrestrained migration become apparent, the tide of public opinion is turning against the government's open-door policy. Observers say that German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the so-called most powerful woman in the world, may have met her Waterloo.
A report published by the newspaper Die Welt on September 27 sheds light on the targeting of Christians by Muslims in German refugee shelters. The paper interviewed an Iranian convert to Christianity who said:

"In Iran, the Revolutionary Guards arrested my brother in a house church. I fled from the Iranian secret service because I thought that in Germany I could finally live my faith without persecution. But in the refugee shelter, I cannot admit that I am a Christian, or I would face threats.
"Muslims wake me before the crack of dawn during Ramadan and say that I should eat before sunrise. When I decline, they call me a kuffar, an unbeliever. They spit at me. They treat me like an animal. They threaten to kill me."

At a refugee shelter in Hemer, a town in North Rhine-Westphalia, 10 Algerian asylum seekers attacked a Christian couple from Eritrea with glass bottles. The Muslims said they were angry that the man was wearing a cross. They ripped the cross from his neck and stole his money and cellphone.
Die Welt also interviewed an Iraqi Christian family from Mosul who were living at a refugee shelter in the Bavarian town of Freising. The father said that threats by Islamists were a daily fact of life. "They shouted at my wife and hit my child," he said. "They say: 'We will kill you and drink your blood.'" Life in the shelter, he said, was as if in a prison.
According to the director of the Munich-based Central Committee for Oriental Christians, Simon Jacob, these incidents are only "the tip of the iceberg." "The actual number of attacks is very high," he said. "We have to expect further conflict, which the migrants bring to Germany from their homelands. Between Christians and Muslims. Between Shiites and Sunnis. Between Kurds and extremists. Between Yazidis and extremists."
Max Klingberg, the director of the Frankfurt-based International Society for Human Rights (Internationale Gesellschaft für Menschenrechte, IGFM), says that much of the aggression is being perpetrated by Afghans and Pakistanis, who are "even more Islamic than some Syrians and Iraqis." He warns that conflict in the refugee shelters will only become worse:

"We have to dispense with the illusion that all of those who are coming here are human rights activists. Among those who are arriving here now, a substantial number are at least as religiously intense as the Muslim Brotherhood.
"We are getting reports of threats of aggression, including threats of beheading, by Sunnis against Shiites, but Yazidis and Christians are the most impacted. Those Christian converts who do not hide their faith stand a 100% probability of being attacked and mobbed."

In a September 29 interview with the newspaper Passauer Neue Presse, the head of the German police union (Deutschen Polizeigewerkschaft, DPolG), Rainer Wendt, warned that "brutal criminal structures" have taken over the refugee shelters and that police are overwhelmed and unable to guarantee safety and security. He called for Christians and Muslims to be separated before someone gets killed:

"We have been witnessing this violence for weeks and months. Groups based on ethnicity, religion or clan structures go after each other with knives and homemade weapons. When these groups fight each other at night, all those German citizens who welcomed the migrants with open arms at the Munich train station are fast asleep, but the police remain awake and are left standing in the middle...
"We can only estimate the true extent of violence because women and children are often afraid to file a complaint. Since it is also about sexual abuse and rape...
"Sunnis are fighting Shiites, there are Salafists from competing groups. They are trying to impose their rules in the shelters. Christians are being massively oppressed and the Sharia is being enforced. Women are forced to cover up. Men are forced to pray. Islamists want to introduce their values and order at the shelters.

Wendt gave the interview days after 300 Albanian migrants clashed with 70 Pakistani migrants at a refugee shelter in Calden, a town in the state of Hesse, on September 27. More than a dozen people, including three police officers, were injured in the melee, which erupted after two migrants got into a fight while waiting in line at the canteen. It took 50 police officers several hours to restore order at the shelter, which is home to 1,500 migrants from 20 different countries.
More than 60 migrants, including ten children, were injured after Pakistanis and Syrians clashed at the same shelter on September 13. The fight broke out just after midnight, when someone sprayed mace into a tent filled with sleeping migrants. Police did not inform the public about the fight for more than a week, apparently to prevent fueling anti-immigrant sentiments.
Violent brawls are becoming commonplace at German refugee shelters across the country.

In the past two months alone, dozens of violent brawls and riots between different groups of migrants have erupted in Germany's refugee shelters.

On September 30, migrants went on a rampage at a refugee center in Braunschweig, a city in Lower Saxony. On September 29, Syrian migrants clashed at a refugee shelter in Gerolzhofen, a small town in Bavaria. Also on September 29, migrants from Algeria and Mali clashed at a refugee center in Engelskirchen, a town in North Rhine-Westphalia.
On September 28, more than 150 Syrians and Pakistanis clashed at a refugee shelter on Nöthnitzer Straße in Dresden. The migrants attacked each other with wooden planks and metal bars. Two dozen police officers were needed to restore order. More than 30 Syrians and Pakistanis clashed at the same shelter on August 10.
Also on September 28, between 100 and 150 migrants of different nationalities clashed at a refugee shelter in Donaueschingen, a town in the Black Forest. The trouble started over a dispute about who should be able to use the shower facilities first. On September 22, more than 400 migrants marched through town to protest conditions at the same facility. On September 15, a male migrant was attacked by another migrant for using a female bathroom at the shelter.
On September 24, around 100 Syrians and Afghans clashed at a refugee shelter in Leipzig, the largest city in Saxony. The fight broke out after a 17-year-old Afghan pulled a knife on an 11-year-old Syrian girl at the shelter, which houses 1,800 migrants. On September 23, migrants clashed at a refugee shelter for unaccompanied minors in Nuremberg.
On September 3, Syrian migrants attacked security guards at a refugee shelter in the Moabit district of Berlin. Also on September 3, Iraqi migrants attacked security guards at a refugee shelter in Heidelberg. A total of 21 squad cars were dispatched to restore order. On September 2, Algerian and Tunisian migrants clashed at the same shelter. A dozen police cars were deployed to restore order.
On September 3, migrants clashed at a refugee shelter in Hövelhof, a town in North Rhine-Westphalia. On September 2, migrants clashed at a refugee facility in Wolgast, a town in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. Also on September 2, migrants clashed at a refugee center in Gütersloh, a town in North Rhine-Westphalia.
On September 1, migrants clashed at a refugee shelter in Delitzsch, a town in Saxony. A 27-year-old Tunisian migrant was killed after being stabbed by a 27-year-old migrant from Morocco. Also on September 1, a 15-year-old Somali migrant stabbed a 15-year-old Egyptian migrant with a scissors at a refugee center in the Groß Borstel district of Hamburg.
On September 1, Somali, Syrian and Albanian migrants clashed at a refugee center in Tegernsee, a small town in Bavaria. Also on September 1, migrants clashed at a refugee shelter in Heidelberg.
On August 31, Libyan and Tunisian migrants clashed at a refugee shelter in Hoyerswerda, a town in Saxony. Also on August 31, migrants clashed with each other and with security guards at a refugee shelter in Heidelberg. On August 30, a 25-year-old Sudanese migrant was arrested for going on a rampage at a refugee shelter in Jesteburg, a small town in Lower Saxony.
On August 29, a 17-year-old Algerian migrant was arrested for robbing the cellphones of other migrants at a refugee center in Elzach, a town in Baden-Württemberg. On August 25, 60 migrants went on a rampage at a refugee shelter in Karlsruhe.
On August 24, a migrant from Montenegro was stabbed by a migrant from Algeria at a refugee shelter in Seevetal, a town in Lower Saxony.
On August 22, Afghan migrants clashed at a refugee shelter in Rotenburg, a town in Hesse. Also on August 22, at least 20 migrants went on a rampage at a refugee center in Grafing, a town near Munich.
On August 21, migrants clashed at a refugee facility in Schwetzingen, also in Baden-Württemberg. Also on August 21, migrants clashed at a refugee center in the Marienthal district of Hamburg.
On August 16, 50 migrants attacked each other with broken tree branches, umbrellas and trash cans at a refugee center in Friedland, a town in Lower Saxony. The facility, which has a capacity of 700, is home to 2,400 migrants.
On August 19, at least 20 Syrian migrants staying at an overcrowded refugee shelter in the eastern German town of Suhl tried to lynch an Afghan migrant after he tore pages from a Koran and threw them in a toilet. More than 100 police officers intervened; they were attacked with stones and concrete blocks. Seventeen people were injured in the melee, including 11 refugees and six police officers. The Afghan is now under police protection. The president of the German state of Thuringia, Bodo Ramelow, said that to avoid similar violence in the future, Muslims of different nationalities must be separated.

On August 10, 40 migrants clashed at a refugee shelter on Bremer Straße in Dresden.

On August 1, 50 Syrians and Afghans clashed at the same shelter. More than 80 police officers were needed to restore order.

According to Jörg Radek, the vice chairman of Germany's police union, (Gewerkschaft der Polizei, GdP), police have reached the "absolute breaking point," and Christian and Muslim migrants should be housed separately. In a September 28 interview with the newspaper Die Welt, Radek said:

"Our officers are increasingly being called to respond to confrontations in refugee shelters. When there are 4,000 people in a shelter which only has space for 750, this leads to aggression where even something as insignificant as a walk to the restroom can lead to fisticuffs.
"We must do everything we can to prevent further outbreaks of violence. I think it makes perfect sense to separate migrants according to their religion."

Not everyone agrees. In an interview with N24 television, the former mayor of the Neukölln district of Berlin, Heinz Buschkowsky, warned that if migrants are separated by religion and nationality, Germany risks the permanent establishment of parallel societies throughout the country.
Buschkowsky said the first lesson migrants must learn when they arrive in Western countries is tolerance, and if they refuse to accept people of other faiths, their asylum applications should be rejected. He expressed pessimism about the possibility of integrating the current wave of migrants into German society: "The bulk of the migrants who are arriving here cannot be integrated."
Meanwhile, the head of German intelligence, Hans-Georg Maaßen, was warned that radical Muslims in Germany are canvassing the refugee shelters looking for new recruits. He said:

"Many of the asylum seekers have a Sunni religious background. In Germany there is a Salafist scene that sees this as a breeding ground. We are observing that Salafists are appearing at the shelters disguised as volunteers and helpers, deliberately seeking contact with refugees to invite them to their mosques to recruit them to their cause."

The editor of the newspaper Neue Westfälische, Ansgar Mönter, reports that Salafists in Bielefeld, a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, have already infiltrated refugee centers in the area by bringing toys, fruits and vegetables for the migrants.

Mönter says "naïve" politicians are contributing to the radicalization of refugees by are asking Muslim umbrella groups in the country to reach out to the migrants.

Mönter points out that the main Muslim groups in Germany all adhere to fundamentalist interpretations of Islam and are anti-Western in outlook. Some groups have ties to the Muslim Brotherhood while others want to implement Sharia law in Germany. According to Mönter, politicians should not be encouraging these groups to establish contact with the new migrants.
 

 

Soeren Kern is a Senior Fellow at the New York-based Gatestone Institute. He is also Senior Fellow for European Politics at the Madrid-based Grupo de Estudios Estratégicos / Strategic Studies Group. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter. His first book, Global Fire, will be out in early 2016.

Source: http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/6614/germany-sharia-refugee-shelters

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

MSM Lies about Muslim Lies - Raymond Ibrahim

by Raymond Ibrahim

The WaPo cites taqiyya-practicing Muslims to prove Dr. Carson wrong about taqiyya.

 

 

Raymond Ibrahim is a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center.
Originally published by the Gatestone Institute. ​

Dr. Ben Carson’s recent assertion that the Islamic doctrine of taqiyya encourages Muslims “to lie to achieve your goals” has prompted the Washington Post’s Glenn Kessler to quote a number of academics to show that the presidential candidate got it wrong:

The word “taqiyya” derives from the Arabic words for “piety” and “fear of God” and indicates when a person is in a state of caution, said Khaled Abou El Fadl, a professor of law at the University of California at Los Angeles and a leading authority on Islam.

[…]

“Yes, it is permissible to hide the fact you are Muslim” if a person is under threat, “as long as it does not involve hurting another person,” Abou El Fadl said. 

The other academics whom Kessler quotes—including Omid Safi, director of the Duke University Islamic Studies Center, and Noah Feldman of Harvard Law School—make the same argument: yes, taqiyya is in the Koran but it only permits deception in the case of self-preservation, nothing more. 

Not exactly.

Although the word taqiyya is related to the Arabic word “piety” and its root meaning is “protect” or “guard against”—and the Koran verses that advocate it (3:28 and 16:106) do so in the context of self-preservation from persecution—that is not the whole story.  

None of the academics quoted by Kessler bothered to acknowledge that the Koran is not the only textual source to inform Muslim action.  They ignore the Hadith, the collected words and deeds of Muhammad.  Koran 33:2, for instance, commands Muslims to follow Muhammad’s example, and his example—also known as the prophet’s Sunna—is derived from the many volumes of Hadith.   

The importance of Muhammad’s example is seen in that the Sunnis, approximately 90% of the world’s Muslim population, are named after his Sunna.  As one Muslim cleric puts it,  “Much of Islam will remain mere abstract concepts without Hadith [whence the Sunna is derived]. We would never know how to pray, fast, pay zakah, or make pilgrimage without the illustration found in Hadith...”

It is therefore careless or disingenuous for Kessler and his “experts” to ignore Muhammad’s example as recorded in the Hadith in their discussion of taqiyya.

As usual, for the complete truth, one must turn to scholarly books written in Arabic.  According to Dr. Sami Mukaram, an Islamic studies professor specializing in taqiyya, and author of the only academic book exclusively devoted to it, “Taqiyya in order to deceive the enemy is permissible.”  

This sounds similar to Carson’s assertion that taqiyya allows Muslims  “to lie to achieve your goals.”

As proof, Mukaram documents two canonical anecdotes from Muhammad’s Sunna—his example to Muslims—that make clear that the prophet allowed his followers to lie and deceive non-Muslims above and beyond the issue of self-preservation:   

The Assassination of Ka‘b ibn Ashraf

An elderly Jewish leader, Ka‘b ibn Ashraf, mocked Muhammad, prompting the prophet to exclaim, “Who will kill this man who has hurt Allah and his messenger?” A young Muslim named Ibn Maslama volunteered on condition that to get close enough to Ka‘b to murder him, he needed permission to lie to the Jew.

Allah’s messenger agreed. Ibn Maslama traveled to Ka‘b and began to complain about Muhammad until his disaffection from Islam became so convincing that Ka‘b eventually dropped his guard and befriended him. 

After behaving as his friend for some time, Ibn Maslama eventually appeared with another Muslim also pretending to have apostatized.  Then, while a trusting Ka‘b’s guard was done, they attacked and slaughtered him, bringing his head to Muhammad to the usual triumphant cries of “Allahu Akbar!”

The Disbanding of the Confederates 

In another account, after Muhammad and his followers had attacked, plundered, and massacred a number of non-Muslim Arabs and Jews, the latter assembled and were poised to annihilate the Muslims once and for all (at the Battle of the Trench, 627).   But then Naim bin Mas‘ud, one of the leaders of these “confederates,” as they became known in history, secretly went to Muhammad and converted to Islam. The prophet asked him to return to his tribesmen and allies—without revealing that he had joined the Muslim camp—and to try to get them to abandon the siege.  “For,” Muhammad assured him, “war is deceit.” 

Mas‘ud returned, pretending to be loyal to his former kinsmen and allies, and began giving them bad advice. He also subtly instigated quarrels between the various tribes until, no longer trusting each other, they disbanded. 

Mas‘ud became a hero in Islamic tradition.  He is often seen as being responsible for helping an embryonic Islam grow at a time when its existence was threatened.  One English language Muslim site even recommends his actions as illustrative of how Muslims can subvert non-Muslims.

In the two examples above, Muslims deceived non-Muslims not because they were being persecuted for being Muslim—the Washington Post’s definition of taqiyya—but in order to make Islam supreme.  (The Arabs and Jews met Muhammad at the Battle of the Trench because Muhammad and his followers first attacked them at the Battle of Badr and massacred hundreds of them on other occasions.)

Despite these stories being part of the Sunna to which Sunnis adhere, UCLA’s Abou El Fadl—the primary expert quoted by the Washington Post to show that Islam does not promote deceit—claims that “there is no concept that would encourage a Muslim to lie to pursue a goal. That is a complete invention.”

Tell that to Ka‘b ibn Ashraf, whose head was cut off for believing Muslim taqiyya.  The prophet of Islam allowed his followers to lie to the Jew to slaughter him—just as he encouraged Mas‘ud to lie to his non-Muslim family and allies.

Thus, Dr. Ben Carson got it right when he said that taqiyya  “allows, and even encourages you to lie to achieve your goals.”  The all-important example of the prophet makes that clear.

Raymond Ibrahim is a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center, a Judith Friedman Rosen Writing Fellow at the Middle East Forum and a CBN News contributor. He is the author of Crucified Again: Exposing Islam’s New War on Christians (2013) and The Al Qaeda Reader (2007).

Source: http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/260311/msm-lies-about-muslim-lies-raymond-ibrahim

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

The Tender Trap: Palestinians and the Truth - Michael Curtis

by Michael Curtis

It is revealing that an organization claiming to call for the rights of Palestinians should have acted so callously towards them.

We have the truth on the highest authority. Fawzi Barhoum, spokesperson for Hamas, in denying in May 2015 that his organization was engaged in “secret talks” with Israel, called Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority, a liar and a slanderer. One must admit that Barhoum is not always trustworthy with the truth since in August 2012 he proclaimed, “the Holocaust is a big lie.”

Evidently Hamas has got Abbas under its skin. Barhoum’s vitriolic remarks are relevant in view of two recent factors: the remarks in Abbas’s speech at the United Nations General Assembly on September 31, 2015, and the important Amnesty International report on the conduct of Hamas. The issue of the truth of Palestinian allegations as well as the legitimacy of the authority of Abbas, now in the eleventh year of his four-year term of office, should be given serious consideration.

In his UN speech President Abbas delivered his “bombshell” that Palestinians would stop abiding by the Oslo Accords. This came as a surprise because Palestinian leaders had stopped abiding by them virtually since they were agreed. It was not Israel that had destroyed the foundations on which political and security agreements are based. It was not helpful that Abbas, a person supposedly interested in peace, refers to what he calls “the state of Palestine with pre-1967 Borders with East Jerusalem as its capital” as a state under occupation.

There are legitimate differences of opinion about the building of Israeli settlements. Yet, whatever one’s views on them, they do not constitute what Abbas called colonial military occupation of the land of the Palestinian people , nor are they examples of Israeli brutality or aggression and racial discrimination. Not surprisingly, Abbas using the historical fiction of the Palestinian Narrative of Victimhood, forgets the true nature of the events of May 1948 and the Arab states attacks on the new State of Israel.

Again, Palestinian refugees are inaccurately referred to as victims of the Al-Nakba (catastrophe) that occurred in 1948.  Abbas, surrounded by 193 countries in the UN most of which are guilty of serious violations of human rights, and at a moment of chaos in Syria and Iraq as well as among the Palestinian organizations themselves, asked an absurd question: “will the world allow Israel to continue its occupation, the only (sic) occupation in the world?”

The speech of Abbas may have been absurd and counterproductive for prospects for peace in the Middle East, but the real “bombshell” was dropped by Amnesty International (AI). In May 2015 AI , not considered an organization overly friendly  towards Israel, issued a report “Strangling Necks: Abduction, Torture, and Summary Killings of Palestinians by Hamas forces during the 2014 Gaza/Israel Conflict.”

The report is a scathing indictment of serious Palestinian crimes and violations of human rights by Hamas which has had nominal authority over the Gaza Strip for nearly fifteen years. All objective observers realized that Hamas and Palestinian armed groups had committed war crimes by firing indiscriminately thousands of rockets and other projectiles into southern Israel. Fewer were aware, or acknowledged, that Hamas forces has vcarried out a brutal campaign of abductions, torture, and unlawful killings against Palestinians accused of “collaborating” with Israel and others during Israel’s 50-day military response, Operation Protective Edge, to the Hamas attacks on civilians in Israel.

The AI report details a series of abuses, including the extrajudicial execution of at least 23 Palestinians and the torture of many others, including members and supporters of Fatah, the organization headed by Abbas. Hamas took the opportunity to settle scores with other Palestinians, in a ruthless series of unlawful killings and other grave abuses. Hamas committed horrific abuses against people in its custody. These actions, designed to exact revenge and spread fear across the Gaza Strip, were war crimes. Among them was the use of civilian places, such as hospitals, for military purposes and for detaining, interrogating, and torturing  supposed “suspects.”

From the start Hamas lied about its actions. At least 16 of those it executed for “collaboration” with Israel were in fact in the custody of Hamas before the 2014 fighting began. Many prisoners were summarily executed.

Hamas also abducted, tortured, and attacked members of Fatah. What is important, in the light of Palestinian allegations against Israel, is that no one, not a single person, has been held accountable for the crimes committed during the 2014 conflict. Indeed, the Hamas leaders have actually encouraged the crimes, the tortures and murders, against innocent and powerless individuals. The torture included beatings with truncheons, gun butts, hoses and wires. Some people were burnt to death with fire, hot metal, or acid.

A particularly shocking incident was the public execution of six men by Hamas forces outside al-Omari mosque on August 22, 2014 in the presence of hundreds of spectators including children. The men were hooded, dragged along the floor, and then individually shot in the head with an AK-47.

It is revealing that an organization claiming to call for the rights of Palestinians should have acted so callously towards them. President Abbas and his followers have falsely claimed that Palestinians are trapped in a racist and apartheid Israel which uses “brutal force,” in general and particularly against the Al-Aqsa mosque on the Temple Mount where Jews are not allowed to pray and where Israel is keeping order to prevent riots.

It is unfortunate that Abbas in his speech at the UN did not mention that it is his fellow Palestinians who are preventing what he calls the inalienable, legitimate rights of Palestinians from being implemented. 


Michael Curtis

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2015/10/the_tender_trap_palestinians_and_the_truth.html

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

PM: Palestinian incitement to blame for brutal Samaria murder - Shlomo Cesana and Israel Hayom Staff

by Shlomo Cesana and Israel Hayom Staff

 Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemns murder of Jewish couple by Palestinian terrorists, lambastes Palestinian Authority for failing to denounce violence • Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon: We will not rest until those responsible are apprehended.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu | Photo credit: EPA

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday condemned the murder of an Israeli couple by Palestinian terrorists, saying the attack was a direct result of the Palestinian Authority's relentless incitement against Israel.

Eitam and Naama Henkin, from the Samaria community of Neria, were gunned down while traveling with their four young children on a road between the Samaria communities of Elon Moreh and Itamar, east of Nablus.

Netanyahu, who is currently in New York, was briefed on the incident shortly after it took place.

"This is a difficult day for Israel. This was a shocking, brutal murder of two parents, who left four orphans behind. Our hearts go out to the children and their family. These murderers knew they were killing a mother and a father. This proves, yet again, that the Palestinians' wild incitement breeds terrorism and murder," he said. 

After a briefing with defense officials, including IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gadi Eizenkot and Shin Bet security agency Director Yoram Cohen, Netanyahu said "steps will be taken to ensure these murderers are apprehended, as well as increase the sense of security on the ground." 

Netanyahu lambasted the Palestinian Authority for not denouncing the attack. "There has been no condemnation from the Palestinian Authority. After the rare attack on an Arab family in Duma, my government and I immediately denounced the act in the strongest possible terms. We did everything in our power to help the family. All the Palestinians are offering is roaring silence. They incite violence and this is the result," he said.

The prime minister added that if Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas "continues with his incitement and refrains from resuming negotiations," he will lose his position as a partner in the peace process. Nevertheless, Netanyahu stressed that he would prefer pursuing ways to reignite the peace talks with the Palestinian Authority rather than declaring Abbas is no longer a negotiating partner. 

A statement by Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon said, "This murderous attack is the clear result of the Palestinians' incitement against the State of Israel and the Israeli public. 

"The war on terror demands we demonstrate determination, patience and an iron fist. We are fighting a ruthless, bloodthirsty enemy, and unfortunately, lives are lost along the way. The IDF and the Shin Bet are conducting a manhunt for these killers, and we will not rest until they, and those who sent them, are apprehended. I offer my condolences to the family," Ya'alon said. 

President Reuven Rivlin expressed his horror over Thursday's attack: "Heinous murderers claimed the lives of two parents tonight, leaving their small children orphaned. The depth of this act's hatred and cruelty is devastating. We will continue to relentlessly fight this ruthless terrorism, and it is our enemies who should beware. It is our duty. It is the only way we can ensure our children and grandchildren's safety, and our right to live in peace, anywhere in Israel. The children are in our thoughts and prayers," he said.

"The U.S. strongly condemns the terrorist attack that took place late Thursday evening in the West Bank. We extend our condolences to the victims' family. We urge all sides to maintain calm, avoid escalating tensions in the wake of this tragedy, and work together to bring the perpetrators to justice," State Department spokesman John Kirby said.

U.N. Middle East envoy Nickolay Mladenov condemned the violence and called for calm. "In order to avoid escalation all must refrain from inflammatory statements and retaliatory action that can only further exacerbate an already tense environment," he said in a statement issued Thursday night.

Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely (Likud) slammed the "Palestinian incitement mechanism, which drives these murderous terrorist attacks across Judea and Samaria. These kinds of events only prove that the Palestinians are not interested in dialogue and peace, only in hatred. I'm sure our security forces will apprehend the killers."

Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid denounced the attack, saying, "These heinous terrorists should know that they are not immune and that they will be made to pay the price for their actions. Israel's war on terror must remain unwavering. We must spare no effort to ensure the Israeli public's safety and security." 

Culture and Sport Minister Miri Regev (Likud) noted that "24 hours after the speech given by the arch-terrorist Abu Mazen [Abbas] before the U.N. a husband and wife were murdered. This is painful proof that Israel must intensify its war on terror."

Habayit Hayehudi Chairman Naftali Bennett said, "Abu Mazen's call to arms was heeded tonight in the bloodiest of ways. A people whose leaders encourage bloodshed will never have a country." 

Science, Technology and Space Minister Ofir Akunis (Likud) said the best way to counter Palestinian terrorism would be to bolster the settlement enterprise across Judea and Samaria. Agriculture and Rural Development Minister Uri Ariel (Habayit Hayehudi) echoed the demand.

"The murder Samaria is despicable and painful. The IDF and security forces should act swiftly and with determination to apprehend the killers and bring them to justice," Opposition Leader MK Isaac Herzog (Zionist Union) said.

Zionist Union MK Zoher Behalul said, "My heart broke when I heard about this terrible terrorist attack. An entire family was torn to shreds. There has to be another way. ... How much longer will innocent people, on both sides, have to pay for the diplomatic stalemate? Revenge is not the answer, only negotiations, hard as they may be, can breed hope."

Shlomo Cesana and Israel Hayom Staff

Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=28651

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.