Saturday, February 25, 2017

Real Anti-Semites Against Fake Anti-Semitism - Daniel Greenfield




by Daniel Greenfield


The left opposes bombing synagogues except when it supports it.




Keith Ellison is suddenly very concerned about anti-Semitism.

The former Nation of Islam member who appeared on stage with Khalid Abdul Muhammad (“that old no-good Jew, that old imposter Jew, that old hooked-nose, bagel-eating, lox-eating… just crawled out of the caves and hills of Europe, so-called damn Jew”) and defended the anti-Semitism of Louis Farrakhan (“Do you know some of these satanic Jews have taken over BET?”) is worried about the hatred of Jews.

The leading candidate to head the DNC who used to rant about, “European white Jews…  trying to oppress minorities all over the world” denounced President Trump for having, “taken… so long to even say the word ‘anti-Semitism.’”

How long did it take Ellison to stop defending the anti-Semitism of Farrakhan or of Joanne Jackson?

And Ellison isn’t through yet. He associates with CAIR, a hate group that has defended terrorists who target synagogues, and touts an endorsement from Jesse “Hymietown” Jackson.

Keith Ellison put out a press release after the bomb threats to Jewish centers declaring, "To all those who have felt threatened: I stand with you."

Speaking of threats, the Minnesota Daily opinion editor, Michael Olenick, had described Ellison’s writing as "a genuine threat to the long-term safety and well-being of the Jewish people, a threat that history dictates must not be ignored."

Except it was ignored.

Ellison is currently opposed to bomb threats to Jewish centers. That’s progress. But he’s closely allied with CAIR and other Islamist groups that have defended actual synagogue bomb plotters. CAIR has spread claims that the Muslim terrorists who plotted to bomb the Riverdale Jewish Center and Temple were really the victims of government entrapment.

When Ahmed Ferhani was arrested for a plot to attack a synagogue, CAIR held a rally to support him.

Linda Sarsour, who had described throwing stones at Jews as “the definition of courage”, accused the Trump administration of anti-Semitism. Sarsour claims to be raising money to repair a vandalized Jewish cemetery. While the campaign was touted by the media, it is unclear who the actual donors are.

What is clear is that Linda Sarsour supported Ahmed Ferhani. Sarsour insisted on calling the anti-Semitic terrorist a “boy” or a “kid”. She also defended the Riverdale Jewish Center bomb plotters.

At his trial, Ahmed Ferhani had boasted, "I intended to create chaos and send a message of intimidation and coercion to the Jewish population of New York City."

“Look at the Jewish guy. You’re not smiling no more, you f___r. I hate those bastards. I hate those m______s. Those f____g Jewish bastards. I’d like to get one of those. I’d like to get a synagogue. Me. Yeah. Personally,” James Cromitie had ranted.

This is what Linda Sarsour and the left have been defending for some time now. The vast majority of the accounts you will read about Cromitie, the Newburgh Four, and Ahmed Ferhani, will be positive. Their innocence has been defended by CBS, HBO, the New York Times and countless other media outlets.

Like Keith Ellison and Linda Sarsour, the media is momentarily opposed to burning and bombing synagogues.

It wasn’t always.

In New York City, a year before September 11, Muslims threw firebombs at a synagogue in the Bronx. “A bias-motivated attempt to firebomb a synagogue?” the New York Times asked. “Or a misguided message critical of Israeli policies against Palestinians?”

If the cemetery vandals or JCC callers turn out to be Muslims, the media will ask whether desecrating Jewish graves was bias or a “misguided message critical of Israeli policies against Palestinians?”

That is what makes the sudden outpouring of concern about anti-Semitism shamelessly opportunistic.

Real anti-Semites are fighting fake anti-Semitism as a publicity stunt to attack the first administration to question the wisdom of financing the anti-Semitic mass murder of Jews by Islamic terrorists.

Linda Sarsour is a bigot who supports the anti-Semitic BDS movement and assorted Islamic terrorists. At a pro-Hamas event, she called for limiting friendships with Jews to opponents of the Jewish State. She is expected to share a stage at a BDS event with a woman who played a role in the murder of two Jewish college students.

This is anti-Semitism.

The left has a studied disinterest in true anti-Semitism. It views Linda Sarsour and Keith Ellison as heroes. It makes excuses for Ahmed Ferhani or James Cromitie. It has opportunistically decided to exploit accusations of anti-Semitism to attack President Trump. But if the bomb threats to Jewish centers or the cemetery vandalism turn out to be the work of Muslims, then the hot potato will fall.

Stories about the incidents will quickly go away. The Muslim perpetrators will become victims of entrapment. HBO will air a documentary blaming the whole thing on overzealous FBI agents.

Anti-Semitism also has its fellow travelers. These are the people who are very selective about the anti-Semitism that they reject. They will oppose bombing synagogues only as long as the wrong sort of people are doing it. If the right sort of people bomb synagogues, the issue will become nuanced.

Bombing synagogues will suddenly cease to be a “black and white” issue.

The media has decided to spend a few weeks accusing President Trump of anti-Semitism. Its sudden concern about fake anti-Semitism goes hand in hand with normalizing real anti-Semitism.

Fighting fake anti-Semitism consists of fake left-wing organizations, like the Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect, a group run by two gay rights activists from New Jersey that no one in the Jewish community had ever heard of before, getting airtime on the Fake News media to attack Trump.

Fighting real anti-Semitism would mean holding Linda Sarsour and Keith Ellison accountable for their long history of hating Jews instead of providing them with a platform for their publicity stunts.

The previous administration sent billions of dollars to two terror states, the Palestinian Authority and Iran, which finance the murder of Jews. Not a single of the organizations attacking Trump said a word of protest when our tax dollars were used to pay the salaries of Islamic terrorists in proportion to how many Jews they killed. None of them had a word to say when Obama sent billions in illegal payments to the Iranian paymasters of Hamas and Hezbollah in foreign currency on unmarked cargo planes.

Previous administrations had funded the Palestinian Authority. Obama was the first to fund the PLO, Hamas and Hezbollah. It’s quite an accomplishment for a Nobel Peace Prize winner.

Opposing anti-Semitism doesn’t mean opposing it from people you don’t like. That’s no great challenge. It means opposing it from those you do like. And the media likes Keith Ellison and Linda Sarsour.

The left has always celebrated its anti-Semites. Stop by an event celebrating the literary legacy of Amiri Baraka ("I got the extermination blues, jew-boys. I got the Hitler syndrome figured”) or Alice Walker (“May God protect you from the Jews”... “It’s too late, I already married one.”) 

The left doesn’t oppose anti-Semitism. It opposes the right. It will accuse the right of anti-Semitism when convenient even while its ranks swell with the blackest and ugliest bigotry imaginable. It is rotten with anti-Semitism. It can’t and won’t reject it. It won’t even reject the murder of Jews, the bombing of synagogues and membership in anti-Semitic hate groups when its own heroes are doing it.

Behind the fake outrage is a real outrage. Behind the fake anti-Semitism is real anti-Semitism.

Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is a New York writer focusing on radical Islam.

Source: http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/265898/real-anti-semites-against-fake-anti-semitism-daniel-greenfield

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Israel Prepares As Iran and Hezbollah Ratchet Up the Rhetoric - Ari Lieberman




by Ari Lieberman


Israel’s genocidal enemies beat the drums of war.




According to Arab media sources, the Israeli Air Force launched a series of strikes against military targets within Syria in the early morning hours of Wednesday. The attacks, which reportedly targeted a Hezbollah weapons convoy, occurred near Damascus. According to at least one report, a busload of Hezbollah terrorists was hit, though this was not confirmed.

Israel has neither confirmed nor denied its involvement. The muted Israeli response is consistent with Israel’s policy of acting resolutely to preserve its interests while keeping unnecessary rhetoric and gratuitous bravado under wraps. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for Israel’s enemies who have struck an extremely belligerent tone in recent weeks, even more so than usual.

On Tuesday, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei referred to Israel as a “cancerous tumor” and encouraged Palestinians to revolt until achieving the goal of “complete liberation of Palestine.” Earlier in the week, an unnamed but high-level Syrian official told a Kuwaiti media outlet that Syria “will be partners with Hezbollah in any future war against Israel.”

Not to be outdone, Lebanon’s President Michel Aoun, a corrupt political lackey who is almost certainly on Hezbollah’s (or the Islamic Republic’s) payroll voiced strong support for Hezbollah and its acquisition of sophisticated weapons in violation of United Nations Security Council resolution 1701. He also threatened Israel with an “appropriate response” if Israel violated Lebanese sovereignty.

Of course, the notion of Lebanese sovereignty in any form is laughable since Lebanon is a failed state that is under the full influence and control of the Islamic Republic. In many respects, the state of Lebanon today parallels that of Vichy France. The Lebanese army – a fractured microcosm of a dysfunctional and divided Lebanese society – has taken a subordinate role to Hezbollah and has often acted as an auxiliary force for Hezbollah, coordinating military activities with the terror group. It is thus partly responsible for the degradation of Lebanon’s sovereignty and complicit in violating UNSCR 1701.

But the most cantankerous rhetoric in recent days is emanating from Iran’s premier proxy mercenary force, Hezbollah. Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who’s been in hiding since 2006, announced this week that in the next war with Israel, his organization would not be constrained by red lines and would fire missiles at Israel’s Dimona nuclear facility and at the ammonia storage facilities in Haifa. A direct hit on the ammonia storage facilities could cause widespread injuries on a scale not seen since the Bhopal industrial disaster.

Hezbollah is said to possess approximately 150,000 rockets and missiles of all shapes and sizes. In fact, its formidable missile arsenal surpasses the collective strength most Western armies. One of the missiles that worry Israeli military planners most is the Fateh 110. Hezbollah possesses an unknown quantity of these weapons, which were transferred to the terror group by Iran via Syria.

With a range of between 200 and 300 Km, the Fateh 110 is capable of reaching Haifa, Tel Aviv and Dimona. It carries a payload of 500 Kg and can inflict significant damage on dense population centers. Some have suggested that the missile’s guidance system might be as accurate as 100 m CEP (Circular Error Probable); meaning that it has a 50% chance of landing within 100 meters of its target but this is speculative.

Most of Dimona’s critical platforms are buried deep beneath the surface under thick, protective layers of reinforced steel and concrete and plans to relocate the vulnerable Haifa ammonia facility to a more secure location are in the advanced stages. Nevertheless, the warhead carried by the Fateh 110 can vaporize an entire city block and cause skyscrapers like the Azrieli Towers to collapse.

The 2006 Lebanon war lasted 33 days. On the second day of the war, the Israeli Air Force succeeded in wiping out Hezbollah’s entire long-range rocket capabilities in 34 minutes. With surgical precision, the IAF changed the dynamic of the war. Nevertheless, Hezbollah managed to fire some 4,000 rockets at Israel. Civilian casualties were relatively light but northern Israel was paralyzed. Analysts have surmised that in the next conflict, Hezbollah will fire an average of 1,500 rockets per day.

According to published sources, Hezbollah has managed to acquire sophisticated Russian made Yakhont anti-ship cruise missiles. The Israeli military has had success in thwarting Yakhont shipments but some missiles managed to get through to the terror group. Hezbollah already has a number of Chinese C-802 missiles but the Yakhont carries a larger payload and possesses a more sophisticated guidance system that is capable of better coping with electronic counter measures. Of particular concern is the vulnerability of Israel’s offshore gas platforms to Yakhont missile strikes or surprise naval commando attacks. Hezbollah terror tunnels – similar to those uncovered by the Israel Defense Forces during Operation Protective Edge – are also of grave concern.

Why Israel’s enemies have chosen this particular moment to ratchet up the anti-Israel vitriol in what appears to be a coordinated effort is anyone’s guess. The Syrian and Lebanese armies do not pose serious threats. By contrast, threats emanating from Iran and Hezbollah should be taken very seriously.

Nevertheless, it is unlikely that Hezbollah, cognizant of the thrashing it took during the 2006 Lebanon war and already mired in the Syrian quagmire, would dare open a two-front war with virtually no chance of success. Iran too would stand to lose immeasurably if it initiated aggression against Israel. Such an irresponsible action would be contrary to Russian interests and would have negative ramifications on the JCPOA, possibly leading to its unraveling.

This could be just another case of more bark than bite. Nevertheless, Israel cannot afford to rest on its laurels and its military planners are taking every contingency into consideration. Israel has already provided the United States, the EU and UN with incontrovertible proof that Hezbollah is exploiting the civilian population and using homes, schools and hospitals to store its hardware. In the coming round, Hezbollah will not be able to utilize the high civilian casualty rate to score propaganda points – as in did in 2006 – because the world is already cognizant of the organization’s cynical methods.

Moreover, the Lebanese government’s collusion with Hezbollah in turning a blind eye toward Hezbollah’s illegal activities – including permitting Iranian commercial airliners laden with military equipment to land at Rafic Hariri International Airport – will allow Israel greater freedom of action. Lebanese infrastructure including power plants, electricity grids, bridges, airports and other dual use facilities will all be fair game. Lebanon will revert to the Stone Age.

The next round will certainly be a bloody affair but it will be Hezbollah and Iran – not Israel – that will be left with the short end of the stick.

Ari Lieberman is an attorney and former prosecutor who has authored numerous articles and publications on matters concerning the Middle East and is considered an authority on geo-political and military developments affecting the region.

Source: http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/265903/israel-prepares-iran-and-hezbollah-ratchet-ari-lieberman

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Extremist Muslims' One-Way Street - Burak Bekdil




by Burak Bekdil

Muslims will keep on loving the "infidels" who support Muslim rights in non-Muslim lands, while keeping up intimidation of the same "infidels" in their own lands.

  • Extremist Muslims' understanding of freedom is a one-way street: Freedoms, such as religious rights, are "good" and must be defended if they are intended for Muslims -- often where Muslims are in minority. But they can simply be ignored if they are intended for non-Muslims -- often in lands where Muslims make up the majority.
  • Many Muslim countries, apparently, already have travel bans against other Muslims, in addition to banning Israelis.
  • Look at Saudi Arabia. Deportation and a lifetime ban is the minimum penalty for non-Muslims trying to enter the holy cities of Mecca and Medina.
  • Given the state of non-Muslim religious and human rights, and the sheer lack of religious pluralism in most Muslim countries, why do Muslim nations suddenly become human rights champions in the face of a ban on travel to the U.S.?
  • Meanwhile, Muslims will keep on loving the "infidels" who support Muslim rights in non-Muslim lands, while keeping up intimidation of the same "infidels" in their own lands.
President Donald Trump's executive order of January 27, 2017, temporarily limiting entry from seven majority-Muslim countries – Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen -- for 90 days, until vetting procedures can be put in place -- has caused international controversy, sparking protests both in the Western and Islamic worlds, including in increasingly Islamist Turkey.

This article does not intend to discuss whether Trump's ban is a racist, illegal order, or a perfectly justified action in light of threatened American interests. The ban, right or wrong, has once again unveiled the hypocrisy of extremist Muslims on civil liberties and on what is and what is NOT racist. Extremist Muslims' understanding of freedom is a one-way street: Freedoms, such as religious rights, are "good" and must be defended if they are intended for Muslims -- often where Muslims are in minority. But they can simply be ignored if they are intended for non-Muslims -- often in lands where Muslims make up the majority.

Muslims have been in a rage across the world. Iran's swift and sharp answer came in a Tweet from Foreign Minister Javad Zarif who said that the ban was "a great gift to extremists." A government statement in Tehran said that the U.S. travel restrictions were an insult to the Muslim world, and threatened U.S. citizens with "reciprocal measures." Many Muslim countries, apparently, already have travel bans against other Muslims, in addition to banning Israelis.

Sudan, host and supporter of various extremist Muslim terror groups including al-Qaeda, said the ban was "very unfortunate." In Iraq, a coalition of paramilitary groups called on the government to ban U.S. nationals from entering the country and to expel those currently on Iraqi soil.

In Turkey where the extremist Islamic government is unusually soft on Trump's ban -- in order not to antagonize the new president -- a senior government official called the order "a discriminative decision." Deputy Prime Minister and government spokesman Numan Kurtulmus said:
"Unfortunately, I am of the opinion that rising Islamophobia, xenophobia and anti-immigrant feelings have a great weight on this decision. Taking such a decision in a country such as America, where different ethnic and religious groups are able to co-exist, is very offensive."
The ruling party's deputy chairman, Yasin Aktay, called the ban "racist," and said: "This is totally against human rights, a big violation of human rights." Aktay also said that he had started to "worry about the future of the U.S."

Turkey's top Muslim cleric, Mehmet Gormez, praised the Americans who rushed to the airports to protest the ban. "[This] is very important. It gives us hope," he said -- presumably meaning that non-Muslim protestors will continue to advocate for Muslim rights in non-Muslim lands.

Turkish government bigwigs and the top Islamic authority seem not to have heard of their own country's dismal human rights record when it comes to non-Muslim minorities. Most recently, Turkey's Association of Protestant Churches noted in a report that hate speech against the country's Christians increased in both the traditional media and social media. It said that hate speech against Protestants persisted throughout 2016, in addition to physical attacks on Protestant individuals and their churches.

Nevertheless, the Islamist's one-way sympathy for human rights (for Muslims) and his one-way affection for discrimination (against non-Muslims) is not just Turkish, but global. What is the treatment of non-Muslim (or sometimes even non-extremist Muslim) visitors to some of the Muslim cities and sites in the countries that decry Trump's "racist," and "discriminative" ban that "violates human rights?"

In a 2016 visit to the Al Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, the Muslim custodians of the site did not allow entry to this author, despite the Turkish passport submitted to them, saying "you do not look Muslim enough." And Muslims now complain of "discrimination?" Incidentally, Al Aqsa Mosque is, theoretically at least, open to visits from non-Muslims, except on Fridays.

Look at Saudi Arabia. Deportation and a lifetime ban is the minimum penalty for non-Muslims trying to enter the holy cities of Mecca and Medina. In 2013, the Saudi Minister of Justice, Mohamed el-Eissi, insisted that "the cradle of the Muslim sanctities will not allow the establishment of any other places of worship."

The Saudi ban on other religious houses of worship comes from a Salafi tradition that prohibits the existence of two religions in the Arabian Peninsula. In the Saudi kingdom, the law requires that all citizens must be Muslims; the government does not provide legal protection for freedom of religion; and the public practice of non-Muslim religions is prohibited.

In Iran, where even non-Muslim female visitors must wear the Islamic headscarf, the government continues to imprison, harass, intimidate and discriminate against people based on religious beliefs. A 2014 U.S. State Department annual report noted that non-Muslims faced "substantial societal discrimination, aided by official support." At the release of the report, then Secretary of State John Kerry said: "Sadly, the pages of this report that are being released today are filled with accounts of minorities being denied rights in countries like Burma, Iran, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, many others".

In Iran, marriages between Muslim women and non-Muslim men are not recognized unless the husband produces proof that he has converted to Islam. The mullahs' government does not ensure the right of citizens to change or renounce their religious faith. Apostasy, specifically conversion from Islam, can be punishable by death. In 2013, 79 people from religious minorities were sentenced to a total of 3,620 months in prison, 200 months of probation, 75 lashes and 41 billion rials in fines [approximately $1.3 million].

That being the state of non-Muslim religious and human rights, and the sheer lack of religious pluralism in most Muslim countries, why do Muslim nations suddenly become human rights champions in the face of a ban on travel to the U.S.? Why, for instance, does Turkey never criticizes the extreme shortcomings of freedoms in the Muslim world but calls the U.S. ban "racist?"

Why does the Iranian government think that Trump's ban is a "gift to the [Muslim] extremists?" In claiming that travel bans would supposedly fuel extremism, how come Iran does not think that its own persecution of religious minorities is a "gift" to non-Muslims?

Such questions will probably remain unanswered in the Muslim world. Meanwhile, Muslims will keep on loving the "infidels" who support Muslim rights in non-Muslim lands, while keeping up intimidation of the same "infidels" in their own lands.
Burak Bekdil, one of Turkey's leading journalists, was just fired from Turkey's leading newspaper after 29 years, for writing what was taking place in Turkey for Gatestone. He is a Fellow at the Middle East Forum.
Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/9935/extremist-muslims

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The Ten Worst Cases Of 'Very Fake News' - Deborah Weiss




by Deborah Weiss


A lying press is the enemy of the people.




As you all know by now, Trump has repeatedly accused the MSM of disseminating “fake news”, a charge that is thrown back at Trump by Leftist propaganda media outlets posing as news organizations.  For those of you who do not understand what "fake news" is, it is not just unsubstantiated or inaccurate stories that constitute fake news; it’s the biased (and very possibly coordinated) steady drum beat of characterizations, foundationless questions and the one sided selection of what is reported.  Following are some examples of MSM fake news.

1) The Russians “hacked the election”, giving the false impression that Russia was able to get into the voting machines, and designed to lead the viewer to believe that Donald Trump did not win the election fairly, legally or honestly. 

2) Donald Trump is "anti-Semitic" simply because he didn't word things the way they wanted him to, and ignoring or failing to report Trump’s policy positions that constitute the most pro-Israel positions we have seen in decades, including discussions to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem and the UN Ambassador’s position to ensure that Israel will be protected at the UN. (Contrast this to Obama’s positions, which pandered to anti-Semitic Islamists and allowed unilateral targeting of Israel for scorn, while turning a blind eye to Palestinian terrorism. Yet, “anti-Semitic” was never a charge leveled at Obama).

3) The Left and the MSM are holding Trump “accountable” for “hate crimes”, “racism” and “bigoted comments” that Trump never engaged in, encouraged, or supported.  To the contrary, there are people on the Left who committed violence at pro-Trump rallies sometimes posing as Trump supporters;  Soros-funded organizations financed anti-Trump rallies where actual violence did ensue, and Hillary supporters committed violence at Trump’s speeches in Trump’s name.  Many “hate crime” incidents were nothing more than conjured up stories designed to paint Trump as evil. The MSM reported all this as “news”, clearly never having checked the facts.

4) The MSM including CNN, the New York Times, the Guardian, and even the Wall Street Journal among others, falsely characterized Trump as "inviting Russia” to hack Hillary Clinton’s computer,essentially urging a foreign adversary to conduct cyberespionage against a former Secretary of State.” This was a characterization that totally misinterpreted Trump’s words during the campaign when he pointed out that Russia was not “hacking the election”, and then he sarcastically added that if Russia was hacking the election, he hopes they can find Hillary's missing emails

5) The MSM, across the board, labelled the President’s recent Executive Order as a "Muslim ban" despite the fact that it did not mention Muslims, did not include all or even most Muslim countries and was temporary.  This was clearly done to support the Left’s claims that Trump is “Islamophobic” and it ignored the fact that the Order was intended simply to pause immigration from "countries of concern," which were selected and designated as such by Obama, for long enough to give the Trump Administration a chance to come up with reasonable vetting procedures.

6) The MSM “reports” that the President is “unstable”, when in reality it’s nothing more than they don’t like his demeanor or don't agree with his policies.

7) My favorite is the most recent example: when Trump calls the media out on being fake news, it is characterized as “Trump opposes a free press” and is therefore “dangerous." Round the clock, the press is asking Trump’s aides if the President is going to take action to clamp down on the media or restrict First Amendment rights. Some in the media are making implied comparisons of Trump to tyrants in the Middle East who jail journalists.  But Trump never opposed a free press.  He opposes a lying press.  And he never threatened to make it illegal for the press to continue their lies.  He just let us know that he is going to counter them with facts.

8) Then there is the issue of selective reporting.  For example, as soon as Trump was elected, CNN had non-stop coverage of Obama's great "legacy" and all the "great accomplishments" he achieved, like the failing Obamacare, questionable climate change, and his biggest accomplishment of all -- being the first black president (emphasis on his race, obviously attributable to nothing he’s done).

9) Similarly, as soon as Melania Trump came to the fore, the newstands and stores flooded the stands with photos and stories of America's supposedly beautiful First Ladies, portraying photos of Michelle Obama and Jackie Kennedy on the covers, and glaringly omitting Melania Trump, who was to become the current First Lady mere days after the monthly magazines came out on the stands.

10) Worst of all, the Left makes accusations of fake news when the news is actually real, but they don’t like the facts or conversely, cites parody as real news. This (purposely) confuses the public and makes it harder to distinguish real news from fake news.  Yes, the Left is so full of it, that their claims of fake news are fake.

All of the above examples demonstrate tactics that the MSM uses to relay fake news, influence public opinion, and lead audiences to pre-determined conclusions.  Almost all the MSM news these days is fake.  And the President is right: it’s not just fake news; it’s “very fake news”.   But very fake news is not news at all.  It is commentary, opinion, stories, and sometimes outright fabrications presented as objective fact. 

President Trump’s charge that “the press is the Enemy of the American people” is correct.  But it isn’t because “a free and independent press” is a threat.   It’s because the MSM, while free, is lacking the objectivity that used to constitute the hallmark of prestigious journalism.  The public relies on the media to provide them with unbiased information (to the extent possible), which in turn, will help shape their understanding of events at home and abroad.  Yet today, the constant one-sided, biased, and inaccurate reports flowing out of many “news” outlets more closely resemble propaganda, disinformation, or even influence operations, than they do news. 

Information is power.  Disinformation hurts the public that the media purports to serve.  Yet, at this point, it seems safe to say that you are less informed if rely on the MSM for your information rather than more informed.  My advice? Turn off the MSM and find other sources.  President Trump is right: the lying press is dangerous.

Deborah Weiss, Esq. is a regular contributor to Frontpage Magazine.  She is also a contributing author to the book, “Saudi Arabia and the Global Islamic Terrorist Network”, the main researcher and writer for “Council on American-Islamic Relations: Its Use of Lawfare and Intimidation” and the author of “The Organization of Islamic Cooperation’s Jihad on Free Speech.”  Her work can be found at www.vigilancenow.org.

Source: http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/265905/ten-worst-cases-very-fake-news-deborah-weiss

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Why the UN Deck Is Stacked against Israel - Dan Calic




by Dan Calic

once you understand how the UNHRC is structured with the Muslim nations in control, it becomes clear why they ignore many other obvious problematic areas, and devote so much attention to Israel

It may shock readers to learn that the UN Human Rights Council has passed more anti-Israel resolutions than it has passed against all other countries combined.

Take a look around at the rest of the world. The Syrian civil war has been raging since 2011 with close to 500,000 deaths by various estimates. Hizb’allah has built up an arsenal of 150,000 rockets in Southern Lebanon, which is in flagrant violations of UN resolution 1701. ISIS is terrorizing and murdering people in the Middle East and is responsible for numerous terror attacks in Europe and elsewhere. North Korea continues its rogue behavior, with numerous provocative missile launches. Iran is a threat to the entire Middle East, especially Israel. It launches missiles with “Israel must be wiped out” painted on them. It’s also the single largest state sponsor of terrorism.

In perspective, these are but a few of the highly significant issues plaguing much of the world. Yet the UN seems to have a permanent case of tunnel vision when it comes to Israel.

Keep in mind that Israel is a mere 8,000 square miles in size, or roughly the size of New Jersey. Its total population, including over 1 million Arabs, is just over 8,000,000. The Jewish population of Israel is approximately 6.5 million. Contrast that against the world population of 7.5 billion, Jewish Israel represents less than one tenth of one percent of the entire world.

So why is a tiny country like Israel and its ongoing conflict with the Arab Muslim ‘Palestinians’ standing head and shoulders above much more important issues as far as the UN is concerned? This question may have most people scratching their heads. In fact, a look inside the makeup of the UN provides the answer.

For example let’s take a close look at most anti-Israel body within the organization -- the UN Human Rights Council. Since 2006 when the United Nations Commission on Human Rights changed its name to the United Nations Human Rights Council, it has passed no less than 60 resolutions against Israel. That’s a sustained average of almost one every other month during the past 10 years. In 2016 alone, no less than 20 were passed, including an Incredible 10 on a single day! A total of four were passed against the rest of the world in 2016. This seems almost absurd, until you break down the UNHRC.

There are 47 member nations that comprise the UNHRC. Keep in mind the focus of it is “human rights.” Yet look at some of its members -- China, Cuba, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Qatar, Burundi, Bangladesh, UAE, etc. Shouldn’t members be beacons of protecting human rights? Yet these countries are some of its worst offenders.

Now let’s look at the actual structure of the UNHRC which is quite telling. The nations of the world are divided into five regions: Africa (including the Middle East), Asia, Latin America/Caribbean, Western Europe, and Eastern Europe (the U.S. is part of the Western Europe region).

The African and Asian regions each have 13 members. Latin America/Caribbean has eight members, Western Europe seven and Eastern Europe six. Here’s where the rubber meets the road. Every nation where Muslims make up 50% or more of the general population is in one of two regions -- the African or Asian region. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize if those two regions vote together as a block, their 26 votes comprise an automatic majority of the UNHRC’s 47 members.

Another ironic point is how the U.S. is positioned. Keep in mind the U.S. is the home of the United Nations, putting up roughly 22% of the UN budget. Yet on the UNHRC the U.S. doesn’t even have its own region. It’s buried as a member of the Western Europe region which has a mere seven member nations. It can be easily outvoted by the Muslim-dominated African and Asian regions.

Back to the question of why the UNHRC has been so ardently anti-Israel for many years; once you understand how the UNHRC is structured with the Muslim nations in control, it becomes clear why they ignore many other obvious problematic areas, and devote so much attention to Israel. It sits smack dab in the heart of the Middle East, and has been a thorn in the side of the Arab Muslim world since the moment it was reborn in 1948. The existence of a sovereign Jewish state on land which most of the Muslim world considers holy, especially Jerusalem, represents a huge obstacle to their goal of ‘liberating’ all of Israel in favor of “Palestine.”

Keep in mind another body of the UN, UNESCO, is in the business of revising history by passing resolutions calling obvious Jewish holy sites such as the Cave of the Patriarchs, the Temple Mount, and the Western Wall Muslim holy sites.

Recently the UN Security Council passed a resolution naming Israeli “settlements” as the main obstacle to peace.

The United Nations as an organization is charged with upholding dignity and security for all the nations of the world. Yet, is it acting with equal vigilance enforcing these noble principle when it comes to Israel? The answer is a resounding no! Since the U.S. has a mere one vote in a small region of the UNHRC, it seems there’s little hope for change in its obsession with condemning Israel.

However, now that Donald Trump is president and Nikki Haley is the U.S. ambassador who sits on the Security Council, we should see Israel getting the support it rightfully deserves. Moreover, Trump has indicated the U.S. may consider taking punitive action against the UN and some of its internal bodies, such as reducing or eliminating financial support.

We are in the early stages of a new era. It’s about time someone is ‘Trumpeting’ support for Israel.


For more of Dan Calic’s articles visit his Facebook page.

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2017/02/why_the_un_deck_is_stacked_against_israel.html

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Nine Causes of Scientific Decline in American Academia - Leo Goldstein




by Leo Goldstein

-- over the period from the late 1980s to 2016, many factors had contributed to the downfall of the academic integrity and scientific capacity

People frequently write about academic political bias but rarely about the degradation of academic scientific capacities. Nevertheless, the signs of this degradation are everywhere. One example is embracing the pseudo-science of climate alarmism. The degree of enthusiasm has varied from Caltech’s tacit approval to the full-throat fervor of Harvard University president Dr. Drew Gilpin Faust. Another sign is a chronic failure of the $300 billion-dollar-a-year post-secondary educational system to produce enough computer specialists. Lastly, there’s the academia’s failure to distance itself from the Union of Concerned Scientists (Disclosure: the author has a pending lawsuit against the Union of Concerned Scientists, the Ford Foundation and other defendants.) and the ongoing “Bill Nye the Science Guy” media hoax.

In hindsight, over the period from the late 1980s to 2016, many factors had contributed to the downfall of the academic integrity and scientific capacity. The major factors were:

1. Unnatural, politically-spurred growth of college enrollment without regard to the economic or social demand for the increasing number of college graduates and even the supply of sufficiently prepared and motivated college applicants. This quantity instead of quality approach has been known to be harmful, and it was.

2. The takeover of the universities and colleges by the New Left. Apparently, many radicals of the 60s hadn’t learned from the fall of the Soviet Union and continued to think of the U.S. as an evil “system” that needed to be overthrown. By trusting the good will of its faculty, the university system presented the New Left an excellent opportunity to sabotage scientific development. Not all radicals went into social disciplines to poison the minds of the new generation. Some of them went into science, and corrupted scientific institutions through environmental studies and other means. Their impact was amplified by big money from the Ford Foundation and its ilk.

3. Foreign influence. Science, as a pursuit of knowledge, is international. But scientific recognition can be influenced by politics. Environmental politics of the European Union in the 1990s heavily impacted scientific processes in the U.S.

One of the most important things for a scientist is the ability to publish in peer-reviewed journals. Consequently, editors of the prestigious scientific journals wield enormous power. But most English-language scientific journals have international editorial boards. Furthermore, most scientific journals are owned by foreign publishers. The three largest scientific publishers are: Reed-Elsevier (UK), Springer (Germany), and Holtzbrinck (Germany). The latter two merged in 2015. EU-centric scientific publishing has allowed EU politics to infringe on American science without people noticing.

American academia also corruptly promoted scientists for collaboration with the International Panel on Climate Change and other UN agencies.

4. The rise of "studies" with predetermined results, as opposed to the normative sciences, valued for their understanding of the laws of nature. Certain political developments caused this. Then confrontational environmentalism and tort litigation requested scientists to back their claims, no matter what, and generously paid. This went against all norms. Science starts with empirical facts (observations or experimental results) and arrives to conclusions based on them. “Post-normal science” starts with conclusions (provided by politicians or activists) and contorts itself accordingly to justify these conclusions.

Demand for such “science” came from many places. The Environmental Protection Agency was one of them, while increasingly wealthy environmental organizations were another. During the 1980’s to the 1990’s, we saw the plaintiff bar tearing apart manufacturing industries using tort and product liability laws. Asbestos litigation alone yielded tens of billions of dollars. Some of the loot went to Democratic Party politicians who created and expanded those laws. Even more money was paid to expert witnesses. This money incentivized academics to advance scientifically unsound theories, supporting dubious plaintiff claims.

5. Al Gore! Bill Clinton had an unusual arrangement with his vice president, where he granted Al Gore full responsibility for some functions of the government. Clinton used to say that his VP Gore was the most powerful VP in the history of the country. In fact, Al Gore received an absolute power in science. But Al Gore was incapable of understanding physics and had an almost religious hostility toward modern science and technology. From Rupert Darwall, The Age of Global Warming: A History: “…Gore argued, Bacon and the scientific method thereby contributing to the extreme evils perpetrated by Hitler and Stalin. Gore’s accusation against science shows an extraordinary misreading of history. … Yet Gore’s assault on the Scientific Revolution met with silence from leading academies and societies.” (Kindle Locations 5278-5279, 5283-5285).

6. Affirmative action and diversity policies have come into deadly synergy with environmentalist agendas, successfully tearing down American science. In the 1990s, affirmative action appointees didn’t need any qualifications and bore loyalty to nobody but those who appointed them. Thus, they could be used to carry out any policies, no matter how extreme. For example, Al Gore fired eminent physicist Will Happer from the position of the Director of Research in the Department of Energy for merely proposing measuring effects of postulated ozone layer depletion. Martha Krebs, a Ph.D. without any scientific jobs on her CV, was appointed in his place.

7. Academic scientists’ blindness to these developments seems amazing in hindsight. One explanation is that they supported Democrats and were conditioned to believe that a danger to scientific research and academic freedom comes from conservatives and Republicans.

They were further desensitized because the changes were additive; environmental studies and other nonsense were added as the universities grew, until their influence drowned out that of the hard sciences. If biology professors were fired to let environmental activists take their place, the response would be quite different. In academia, fake scientists prevailed over real scientists and speak on behalf of science now. Fake news media believe them or act as if they do.

8. Suppression of the independent science. The Left and then mainstream Democrats have been ranting about since the 1990s, calling it “corporate science”. The combined litigation and legislation campaign painted as a fight against Big Tobacco is still not sufficiently recognized for what it became. It targeted a highly unpopular and, possibly, evil industry to set the precedent that the Democrats might silence independent scientists by going after the businesses that make them independent.

9. Universities’ abrogation of their duty to prepare new generations of American scientists and engineers. Whether driven by their elitist contempt of preparing specialists demanded by productive economics or by ideological preference, the universities have been churning out radicals in place of skilled graduates able to live in mutual harmony with society. Feminism played its role by demanding a decrease of male faculty and students in science and engineering.

And there was also market dynamics at play. Successful graduates in economically demanded fields have found jobs outside academia, while unemployable “studies” majors stayed in the system and outside nincompoops entered it, staying true to the saying, “Those who can, do. Those who cannot, teach.” This was a recipe for disaster -- more useless faculty generated more useless graduates, many of whom stayed in academia, inflating size of the departments producing more of their kind, and so on. The politics of the National Scientific Foundation also caused exodus of the best scientific minds.

The remaining vacuum has been filled by immigration. More than half of faculty in science and engineering departments of most universities are foreign-born and raised, mostly not from Western countries. I don’t doubt their qualifications, ethics, and loyalty. But, there is one thing they are totally incapable of doing (with few exceptions) -- defending the academic freedom of scientists and the integrity of science. Almost by definition, this means a successful integration of an immigrant working in a university means an acceptance of the Leftist oppression as a norm.

Academia seems to have been allowed to employ an immigration policy of its own. Nearly one million foreign students currently study in the U.S.; the top countries are China, India, South Korea, and Saudi Arabia. Unlike their American counterparts, most foreign students study sciences, math, and engineering.

I know that thousands of outstanding scientists work and teach in academia. Academic institutions are to blame for suppressing or ignoring their contributions.

Thanks to H.J. for collaboration in writing this article.


Leo Goldstein researches and writes about climate alarmism, and its interconnection with other social ills. Until recently, Leo Goldstein wrote under the pen name Ari Halperin.

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2017/02/nine_causes_of_scientific_decline_in_american_academia.html

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Iran’s Supreme Leader Sees the Beginning of a New Era - Shahriar Kia




by Shahriar Kia

-- a policy of firm language against Iran, parallel to economic pressures through sanctions, can bring this regime to its knees.

Following a rocky first month in Trump-Iran relations, it’s significant that Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has chosen to maintain a substantially low profile. Comprehending the threat of vast changes in Washington, Khamenei also knows he cannot show weakness to his dwindling social base already terrified of major changes in the new U.S. administration’s policies vis-à-vis Iran following Obama’s eight years of appeasement.

In recent remarks, Khamenei even said there is no difference between the Obama and Trump administrations (!) and “the real war is the economic war, the sanctions war.”

These are interesting observations from Khamenei, and they should be considered deceptive, because he understands fully well that with Obama gone, so are the concessions the previous White House provided to his regime. Khamenei’s own change in reactions is further proof, as he is seen choosing his words quite carefully.

“To pass this stage, Iran has two options ahead. First, to strongly counter-react in areas in which the United States has vital interests, and the second is for Iran to act within the frameworks laid out by the United States in order to continue to have a role in the region and get out of the harnessed state. No doubt, the second option would ensure more strategic advantages for Iran.” (Jahan-e-Sanat, February 20)

During the Obama years, Khamenei himself used strong terms in threatening American interests across the globe. He went as far as saying that his regime would “raze” Haifa and Tel Aviv to the ground, wasting no time in lashing out at any threats. This also showed how Obama’s appeasement policy failed miserably.

Now that Khamenei is receiving “on notice” level warnings from Washington, he is in fact completely terrified to use any strong terms. However, he is resorting to a new tactic of claiming there being “no difference” between the Obama and Trump administrations. From January 20th onward, Khamenei has repeatedly made such remarks about the two administrations.

This comes at a time when the supreme leader and his inner circle used believed sanctions could have no impact. Such a shift in tone seen in Khamenei is the index that a policy of firm language against Iran, parallel to economic pressures through sanctions, can bring this regime to its knees.

On the other hand, we are witnessing that Tehran’s lobbies, and those who capitalized on massive economic gains rendered through the appeasement policy, are desperately speaking out against any sanctions, and especially the possible designation of the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) as a foreign terrorist organization.

The IRGC controls much of Iran’s economy, and yet Tehran’s lobbies have gone the distance in claiming its blacklisting will threaten America’s interests in Iraq and other countries hosting U.S. bases, and also endangering so-called “moderates” in the face of “hardliners.”

This is nothing but fake news, signaling that not only officials in Tehran, but their decreasing number of international correspondents, are concerned about Obama’s appeasement policy coming to an end.

A firm policy against Iran goes far further than only containing this regime’s nuclear ambitions and foreign meddling. Such a shift can also fuel the Iranian people’s increasing protests against this regime. The exact opposite of Obama turning his back to the 2009 uprising in Iran.

Recent protests in Ahvaz and other cities resembles the Iranian people’s hatred of this regime and their thirst for change.

Ended Sunday, February 20, the Munich Security Conference condemned the Iranian regime for disrupting security and stability in the region. The delegations in the conference had one sentence in common when speaking against the Iranian regime: the Iranian regime is the biggest state sponsor of terrorism in the world, said by U.S. Vice President Mike Pence as well as Saudi FM Adel al-Jubeir. Also, Turkish finance minister Mevlut Chavushoghlu put this same issue another way while pointing to the regime’s interventions in Syria and Iraq. “Iranian regime is seeking sectarianism in the region”, he said.

The new alliance of Arab nations, and especially the participation of Turkey, has raised major concerns among senior officials in Tehran as a strong front against its terrorism and meddling in other countries is formed.

The formation of such a front is a sign of significant policy changes in Washington. This appears to be a step in the direction of regaining the trust lost amongst U.S. allies during the Obama tenure to confront Iran’s terrorism and meddling in the Middle East.

Etemad, for instance, writes on February 21: “the leaders and elite in Saudi Arabia, Israel, and Turkey had this vision in recent years that with Barack Obama as President, the US administration wouldn’t take any specific measure against Iran in order to put Tehran under pressure.”

Military drills and hollow saber rattling by IRGC commanders during the past few days shed light on Iran’s fear and severe weakness of developments in the makings with the incoming policy alterations in Washington.

What needs to be understood is that we are already at the beginning of a new era where the regime in Iran will no longer benefit from an appeasement policy that allows it to both increase its domestic crackdown and foreign warmongering, such as Iran’s involvement in Syria, and continuously threaten to abandon ship on the accord aimed at curbing the Iran nuclear program.

This provides a golden opportunity for the international community to begin standing shoulder to shoulder with the Iranian people and its organized resistance under the leadership of Maryam Rajavi, a Muslim woman who represents a tolerant and democratic Islam against a fundamentalist version of Islam advocated by the mullahs’ regime. Bringing an end to the appeasement policy and, as being recently weighed by the Trump administration, designating Iran’s Revolutionary Guards as a foreign terrorist designation are necessary steps in a long overdue roadmap.

Shahriar Kia is a political analyst writing on Iran and the Middle East. He is the member of the Iranian opposition, the People’s Mujahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI, also known as the MEK). He graduated from North Texas University.

Shahriar Kia

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2017/02/irans_supreme_leader_sees_the_beginning_of_a_new_era_.html

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Would You Want Your Vaccine Produced by Supporters of Jihad? - Judith Bergman




by Judith Bergman

How much trust are Danish consumers supposed to have in a Saudi owned conglomerate, which employs jihadists such as Usmani and donates heavily to jihadist organizations such as the Muslim Brotherhood

  • "Selling the crucial manufacture of vaccines to an ideologically hostile country, which might - for whatever reason – suddenly decide to shut down production, does not sound like a good idea... Those who say that the Saudis are merely interested in profit, just like everybody else, should know better". — Rachel Ehrenfeld, expert on financing terrorism
  • Virtually all political parties supported the Danish government's sale of its vaccine manufacturing facility to the Saudi conglomerate.
  • After the publication of the Danish Mohammad cartoons in 2006, Saudis boycotted Danish goods. Do Danish politicians really have such short memories?
  • Vaccines are not an easy commodity to come by. It takes minimum six months for an order of vaccines to be delivered, but, according to the World Health Organization, delivery can also easily take up to two years.
  • How much trust are Danish consumers supposed to have in a Saudi owned conglomerate, which employs jihadists such as Usmani and donates heavily to jihadist organizations such as the Muslim Brotherhood, who want to bring about a caliphate? The potential for political exploitation is too evident to reject.
Would you want your vaccines produced by a Saudi company that supports jihad? Danes, it seems, may have no choice.

Denmark recently sold its state-owned vaccine manufacturing facility to a conglomerate owned by the Aljomaih Group, a Saudi family dynasty[1] led by Sheikh AbdulAziz Hamad Aljomaih. The sheikh is also the largest single stockholder and chairman of Arcapita Bank, (formerly First Islamic Investment Bank) headquartered in Bahrain. As an Islamic bank, it has a so-called Sharia Supervisory Board comprised of Islamic scholars, who ensure that the bank's activities comply with sharia (Islamic law).

Former Islamic judge and leading Islamic scholar Taqi Usmani, who sits on the bank's Sharia Board, in his book, "Islam and Modernism", writes ruminations such as: "Aggressive Jihad is lawful even today... Its justification cannot be veiled..."

Usami had also, after Danish newspapers reprinted the Mohammad cartoons in 2008, co-signed an appeal to the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), urging it to boycott Denmark:
"If the Danish government does not declare the [publication of] shameful and blasphemous cartoons as a criminal act, the OIC [should] appeal to all Islamic nations for a trade boycott of that bigoted country".
Equally noteworthy is that the spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, Yussuf al-Qaradawi, used to sit on Arcapita's sharia board, until he eventually resigned. Qaradawi, already in 1995, told a Muslim Arab Youth Association convention in Toledo, Ohio, "We will conquer Europe, we will conquer America!" According to Qaradawi, sharia law should be introduced gradually, over a five-year period in a new country. Presumably, this gradually-introduced sharia legal system would include the end of free speech under "blasphemy laws", the denigration and oppression of women, such as women worth half as much as men in court, polygamy, the persecution of Jews (Qaradawi advocates killing all of them), beating wives as a way of "disciplining" them and so on. Only after this transition phase, sharia laws such as killing apostates and homosexuals, as well as chopping off hands for theft, would be introduced.

Given Qaradawi's former prominence in Arcapita, it hardly comes as a surprise that the bank has given financial support to the Muslim Brotherhood in Bahrain, known there as the Al Islah Society. According to a leaked report by former US Ambassador to Bahrain, Ambassador William T. Monroe:
"Arcapita reported giving a total $591,000 in 2003 and $583,000 in 2002 to a variety of charitable organizations... the Islamic Education Society (Al Tarbiya Al Islamiya - Sunni Salafi) and the Al Islah Society (Sunni Muslim Brotherhood) are the largest beneficiaries of Arcapita's charitable giving... We are aware of concerns linking Arcapita advisors and staff to questionable organizations."
In August 2016, the Danish government announced that it "...rejects any organization representing antidemocratic and radicalized environments" and considers the Muslim Brotherhood to be "deeply problematic" and something they "strongly reject".

Clearly not strongly enough.

"Selling the crucial manufacture of vaccines to an ideologically hostile country, which might -- for whatever reason -- suddenly decide to shut down production, does not sound like a good idea. Those who say that the Saudis are merely interested in profit, just like everybody else, should know better", Rachel Ehrenfeld, an expert on the financing of terrorism, told Ekstra Bladet.


Denmark's Statens Serum Institut (State Serum Institute). Image source: Wikimedia Commons/Froztbyte.

Virtually all political parties supported the Danish government's sale of its vaccine manufacturing facility to the Saudi conglomerate. This is strange, given the recent history of Danish-Saudi relations.

After the publication of the Danish Mohammad cartoons in 2006, Saudis boycotted Danish goods. Saudi Arabia's religious leader, Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdul Aziz al-Sheik, demanded that the Danish government hold Jyllands-Posten, the newspaper that printed the Mohammad cartoons, to account and force the newspaper to give an apology: "The government should give [the newspaper] a fine as a deterrence. This is the least that Muslims should demand", he said.

Do Danish politicians really have such short memories?

Vaccines are not an easy commodity to come by. It takes minimum of six months for an order of vaccines to be delivered, but, according to the World Health Organization, delivery can also easily take up to two years. Astonishingly, the Danish state has given the Aljomaih group an incredible start by promising to buy all its children's vaccines from the sheikh for the first 30 months. Only after that will Danish authorities be able to buy their children's vaccines elsewhere. The Danish government has also promised the Aljomaih group not to create new Danish state vaccine production for the first three years.

Should consumers not be able to trust a producer of something as critical as vaccines? How much trust are Danish consumers supposed to have in a Saudi owned conglomerate, which employs jihadists such as Usmani, which donates heavily to jihadist organizations such as the Muslim Brotherhood, which in turn wants to bring about a caliphate? The potential for political exploitation is too evident to reject. Ekstra Bladet ran a poll on its website asking whether Danes were in favor or against the sale: 95% were against it.

Even more remarkable is that the government claims not to have known about the connection between the Muslim Brotherhood and Aljomaih; all the information is easily accessible on the internet.

Health Minister Ellen Trane Nørby has defended the sale: "We did not have several buyers to choose from. We have the buyer we have and it has saved 600 Danish jobs, which would otherwise have been lost".

Is she saying that the safety of Danish citizens is worth 600 jobs?

The sale of the Danish vaccine production facility to the Saudi conglomerate captures perfectly everything that is wrong with European politicians today: their apparent gullibility, their carelessness and their desire to sell out to places such as Saudi Arabia, seemingly without giving much thought to the long-term consequences.
Judith Bergman is a writer, columnist, lawyer and political analyst.

[1] The Group has been active in healthcare through its investment arm AJ Pharma Holding, and it is its Malaysian subsidiary, AJ Biologics, which will take over the vaccine production in the Danish facility in Copenhagen with its 100-year-old history and approximately 500 Danish employees. The deal was a steal for the Aljomaih group, which acquired the vaccine production company for what is believed to be a tenth of its actual value, a mere 15 million DKK.


Judith Bergman is a writer, columnist, lawyer and political analyst.

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/9979/vaccines-saudi-arabia

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