The plan also envisions normalization between Israel and the Arab world, the release of captives and a new regime in Gaza.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken holds a
press conference in Tel Aviv on Jan. 9. 2024. Credit: Chuck Kennedy/U.S.
State Department.
An Israeli source confirmed Thursday that
the Biden administration was currently working on a regional grand
bargain that comprises several tenets aimed at long-term stability as
part of a post-war reality.
Apart from ending the current hostilities
in Gaza it also envisions normalization between Israel and the Arab
world, the release of captives and a new regime in Gaza.
The plan appears to be part of what U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken
referred to when he said in Davos this week that Israel needed to make
tough decisions. The plan is still in a very preliminary stage and it is
unclear how much of it has been formulated into actual text or formulas
that could see the war end and a political process replace it.
Earlier on Thursday the U.K. newspaper Financial Times
reported that Arab countries are working on an initiative to secure a
ceasefire and release of captives from Gaza as part of a broader
normalization plan between Saudi Arabia and Israel—if Jerusalem agreed
to “irreversible” steps towards establishing a Palestinian state.
The Saudi Al-Hadath network
reported from its sources that recently there was a meeting between
senior Israelis, senior Americans and senior Palestinians. According to
the report, the discussions aimed at determining who would govern the
Gaza Strip after the war, and transferring the management of its affairs
to the Palestinian Authority.
According to Financial Times, a
senior Arab official said they hope to present the plan, which would
include establishing relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia, within a
few weeks, to end the war against Hamas and prevent the conflict from
expanding in the Middle East.
Arab sources discussed the plan with their
counterparts in the U.S. and Europe. According to the report, it will
include agreement by Arab states to formally recognize a Palestinian
state, or support the Palestinians, who will receive full U.N.
membership.
One official said, “The real issue is that
there needs to be hope for the Palestinians, it cannot just be economic
benefits or removal of occupation symbols.”
The initiative comes as Israel faces growing international pressure to end the war against Hamas.
“The digging was not secretive,” the Israeli U.N. ambassador said, adding that the United Nations “became an accomplice to Hamas’s crimes.”
A Hamas tunnel destroyed by the Israel Defense Forces on Dec. 8, 2023. Credit: Adansijav Official/Shutterstock.
Israel’s envoy to the United Nations is
crying foul over a claim from a spokesman for the U.N. chief that the
global body didn’t know about Hamas’s web of terror tunnels beneath
Gaza.
Stephane Dujarric, a spokesman for U.N.
Secretary-General António Guterres, was asked on Wednesday whether,
given the sizable U.N. presence amid a multitude of Gazan agencies, the
organization had any indication tunnels were being constructed
“No is clearly the answer for that,” Dujarric said. “It seems to me that all this infrastructure was built in a highly secretive way.”
Gilad Erdan, Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, rejected those claims in a post late on Thursday on social media.
“Watch the U.N. secretary-general’s
spokesperson say the U.N. didn’t know about Hamas terror tunnels in
Gaza! Nothing can be further from the truth,” Erdan posted.
“The secretary-general himself received four detailed letters from me
in the past two years reporting on Hamas tunnels built under Gaza’s
civilian infrastructure including under U.N. facilities.”
Erdan attached screen captures of two of
those letters—one dated Aug. 11, 2021 and the other July 29, 2022—to his
post. The former informed Guterres that Hamas was denying a U.N. agency
an opportunity to inspect a pair of Gazan schools run by the
international body, underneath both of which the Israel Defense Forces
had discovered tunnels.
The following year, Erdan wrote to
Guterres and enclosed detailed proof of the “deliberately close
proximity” that Hamas digs terror tunnels to schools, mosques and
weapons storehouses.
“But wait: there’s more!” Erdan added in his post.
The Israeli envoy cited a 2022 statement
by UNRWA, the Palestinian-only, perpetual U.N. agency for refugees and
their descendants, condemning the presence of a “man-made cavity”
beneath one of its Gazan schools as a breach of neutrality and
international law.
Erdan claimed he briefed UNRWA Commissioner-General Phillipe Lazzarini on the tunnels in 2021.
“The digging was not secretive. The U.N.
knew about it for years but because of its bias, refused to report on it
and became an accomplice to Hamas’s crimes,” he wrote. “Beyond
Shameful!”
Still, Dujarric insisted on Wednesday that
the United Nations was unaware of the sophisticated labyrinth of
tunnels being dug and fortified throughout Gaza.
“I mean, just to see it as an observer, to
think that the U.N. had any understanding of what was,” he said, “any
information about those operations, I think, is: No is clearly the
answer for that.”
If Iran itself is not made to pay a price, it will simply continue using its proxies to escalate aggression and take the hits. After all, that is why Iran has proxies in the first place.
Any evaluation of the Biden
administration's policy towards the Iranian regime (and towards the
Palestinians) reveals a failure: the deadly Western miscalculation that
"being nice" will be reciprocated. In the culture of the Middle East,
that simply does not work. Instead, one is looked on as a gullible
sucker or juicy "mark," like a jolly drunk at a strip club.
As Osama bin Laden pointed out, especially for his region, "When
people see a strong horse and a weak horse, by nature they will like the
strong horse."
Former U.S. Army General Jack Keane recently noted that many
possible targets are already on "the list" and suggested taking out the
military installations that have been launching such attacks. Other
possible responses floated include sinking Iran's spy ship currently in
the Red Sea and taking out Iran's military communications systems.
If Iran itself is not made to pay a price, it will simply
continue using its proxies to escalate aggression and take the hits.
After all, that is why Iran has proxies in the first place.
The Biden administration's reluctance to robustly respond to
the rogue Islamist regime of Iran apparently only reinforces the
inclination of Iran's political and military leadership to inflict more
harm. In 1988, President Reagan launched Operation Praying Mantis, which
retaliated against Iran for its attack on a U.S. Navy ship, sent a
strong message to Iran, and reduced the threat posed by Iranian naval
forces in the Persian Gulf. Pictured: The USS Enterprise, which
played a key role in Operation Praying Mantis, is shown in the Persian
Gulf on December 15, 1998. (U.S. Navy photo by Michael W. Pendergrass)
The Biden administration's reluctance to robustly respond to the
rogue Islamist regime of Iran apparently only reinforces the inclination
of Iran's political and military leadership to inflict more harm.
When US responses lack decisiveness, the Islamic Republic interprets
this "restraint" as a failure of nerve on the part of the US and the
international community. Such leniency, it seems, simply invigorates the
regime to persist in disrupting regional and global stability, and
escalate its assertive military maneuvers and support for terrorist
activities.
As Osama bin Laden pointed out, especially for his region, "When people see a strong horse and a weak horse, by nature they will like the strong horse."
The Iranian regime's militaristic involvement has currently been
unfolding its tentacles across multiple conflicts: Iran's support for
the Houthis; attacks on ships in the region, blocking international
commerce along the Suez Canal's vital international trade route;
encouraging, supplying and funding its proxies Hamas and Hezbollah in
their attacks on Israel, and supplying Russia with drones to attack the
West's ally Ukraine. At the center of all these malign activities is
Iran.
Its participation in attacks
on American bases and soldiers in both Syria and Iraq simply showcases
it intent to drive the US out of the region, the sooner to entrench its
Shiite hegemony in the oil-rich region.
So far, just since mid-October, Iran has orchestrated more than 137 attacksusing
drones, mortars, and short-range missiles on US soldiers in Syria and
Iraq, wounding many of them severely. Iran's military assistance to
Russia underscores its key destabilizing role on the global stage as
well.
Any evaluation of the Biden administration's policy towards the
Iranian regime (and towards the Palestinians) reveals a failure: the
deadly Western miscalculation that "being nice" will be reciprocated. In
the culture of the Middle East, that simply does not work. Instead, one
is looked on as a gullible sucker or juicy "mark," like a jolly drunk
at a strip club. Alternative approaches, conversely, as exemplified in
the Reagan administration's masterful execution of Operation Praying
Mantis, stand as a testament to their success.
Operation Praying Mantis was a military action conducted by the US on April 18, 1988, in the Persian Gulf, in response to the mining of the U.S. Navy frigate USS Samuel B. Roberts by Iran during the Iran-Iraq War. The mining had taken place on April 14, 1988, causing damage to the frigate.
President Ronald Reagan authorized Operation Praying Mantis to retaliate against Iran for the mining and to neutralize Iran's naval capabilities in the region. The operation, carried
out by the U.S. Navy, marked the largest U.S. naval engagement since
World War II. The primary targets were Iranian naval units, including
warships and small boats, which were considered a threat to U.S. and
international shipping in the Persian Gulf.
The U.S. Navy deployed surface ships and aircraft to engage Iranian forces. The USS Enterprise aircraft carrier, along with other vessels, played a crucial role in the operation. During the engagement, U.S. forces sank or severely damaged
several Iranian naval vessels, including frigates, gunboats, and
speedboats. Operation Praying Mantis aimed to demonstrate U.S. resolve
in protecting its and its allies interests and maintaining freedom of
navigation in the Persian Gulf. The U.S. suffered no casualties during the operation, while Iran suffered the loss of multiple naval vessels and personnel.
After the operation, there was a notable cessation
in Iran's harassment of ships and tankers for as long as Reagan was in
office. Operation Praying Mantis achieved its immediate objectives of
retaliating against Iran for the mining incident, sending a strong
message to Iran, and reducing the threat posed by Iranian naval forces
in the Persian Gulf.
Clear and unwavering actions against rogue actors are imperative to
deter disruptive behavior and send a firm message about America's
commitment to ensuring stability. Why does the Biden administration
persist in adhering to a strategy that has clearly proven to be
unsuccessful?
The Biden administration appears terrified of delivering a strong
response to the Iranian regime – a failure of nerve that will surely not
be lost on America's adversaries. Biden might fear that a strong
response would escalate tensions and have adverse implications for his
chances of re-election on November 5, 2024. It is important to bear in
mind, however, historical lessons, such as the reluctance of European
countries to provide a robust response to Hitler's actions -- a move
that ultimately strengthened him and contributed to the outbreak of
World War II.
An approach of "escalate to de-escalate" is probably the most prudent
policy; it allows the US firmly to assert its stance. The strategy
means that a nation, through a show of force or a strong response,
temporarily escalates a situation with the goal of prompting the
opposing party to de-escalate. Former U.S. Army General Jack Keane recently noted
that many possible targets are already on "the list" and suggested
taking out the military installations that have been launching such
attacks. Other possible responses floated include sinking Iran's spy
ship currently in the Red Sea and taking out Iran's military
communications systems.
If Iran itself is not made to pay a price, it will simply continue
using its proxies to escalate aggression and take the hits. After all,
that is why Iran has proxies in the first place.
Dr. Majid Rafizadeh is a business strategist and
advisor, Harvard-educated scholar, political scientist, board member of
Harvard International Review, and president of the International
American Council on the Middle East. He has authored several books on Islam and US Foreign Policy. He can be reached at Dr.Rafizadeh@Post.Harvard.Edu
All Republican members of the House Homeland Security Committee endorsed impeachment of Mayorkas earlier this week.
President Joe Biden admitted to reporters on Friday that he doesn't
believe the southern border is secure, while continuing to defend his
policies.
Fox News correspondent Jacqui Heinrich asked Biden if he believed the border was secure.
"No, it’s not," Biden answered, according to Fox News. "I haven’t believed it for the last 10 years. And I’ve said it for the last 10 years…give me the money."
The correspondent also asked Biden if he believed that Republicans'
attempt to impeach Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro
Mayorkas was unconstitutional. He appeared confused by the question,
according to the outlet.
All Republican members of the House Homeland Security Committee endorsed impeachment of Mayorkas earlier this week.
When Biden was asked if he believed his policies were partially to blame for the chaos at the border, Biden said they weren't.
"No, I’ve…I’ve asked for thousands more, of everything – from judges to…anyway," Biden said.
The Homeland Security Department revealed last month that
the backlog of illegal aliens inside the U.S. has nearly doubled under
Biden to over six million while arrests of suspected terrorists and
violent offenders have also exploded.
President Biden's comments contradict repeated claims by top members of his administration that the southern border is secure.
The Arab TV hosts seemed confused and befuddled about Middle East security and U.S. policy toward the region. Disturbingly, this also appears to be Joe Biden’s thinking about the Middle East.
During recent interviews with two Arab-language TV networks, I was
asked to comment on the Biden administration’s announcement that it has
re-designated Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels as a terrorist
organization. The programs’ hosts asked me to explain why this decision
took so long and whether it indicates a significant change in the Biden
administration’s policy.
My explanation puzzled the Arab TV hosts.
I started out by explaining that, despite press reports that the
Biden administration reversed its 2021 decision to take the Houthis off
the U.S. list of terrorist organizations, this is not exactly correct.
At the beginning of the Biden administration, the president rescinded
decisions by President Trump to place the Houthis on the U.S. list of
Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO) and to name the group a Specially
Designated Global Terrorist organization (SDGT).
The FTO designation represents the generally known U.S. terrorist
group list; the SGDT is a little-known, weaker designation. The Biden
administration only restored the SGDT designation and postponed enacting
it for 30 days. Under this designation, Houthi members can apply for a
U.S. visa; it is not a crime to support them; and U.S. banks are not
required to seize Houthi funds.
Moreover, tough sanctions against the Houthis imposed as part of the
Trump administration’s FTO designation will not be reimposed.
The Arab TV hosts were incredulous about my explanation and asked why
the Biden administration would reimpose a weak terrorist designation
against the Houthis and why, after three months of Houthi missile and
drone attacks against Israel and Red Sea shipping, it took Biden
administration officials three months to make this decision.
I answered that this decision was made for domestic political reasons
in response to growing criticism in the U.S. of how President Biden is
handling increased instability in the Middle East after the horrific
October 7 Hamas terrorist attack against Israel. This was a symbolic
move that allowed the White House to inform the press that the president
was doing something in response to this instability. It was not a serious response to the Houthi missile and drone attacks.
I said I also thought this was an act of desperation by Biden
officials after the airstrikes President Biden ordered against Houthi
missiles and drone facilities in Yemen failed to stop Houthi attacks on
Red Sea shipping.
On the U.S. airstrikes against the Houthis that began on January 12, I
said there was less there than it appeared. Although the first
U.S./U.K. attacks on Houthi military sites were described as massive air
and missile strikes against 60 targets at 16 locations, these attacks
destroyed only about 20% of Houthi missiles and drones because these
weapons are mobile and well-hidden.
In addition, according to a January 17 Wall Street Journaleditorial, the U.S. warned the Houthis of the airstrikes in advance so they could evacuate targeted sites, a move the Journal said made the strikes less effective and probably was interpreted as a sign of U.S. weakness.
I told my Arab TV hosts that it was therefore unsurprising that the
Houthis were undeterred by the airstrikes and escalated attacks against
ships in the region, including a U.S. cargo vessel, which suffered minor
damage from a missile strike, and a cruise missile fired at a U.S. Navy
ship that was intercepted. As a result, the U.S. has conducted several
follow-up attacks against missile and drone sites in Yemen., including
airstrikes on January 17 that targeted 14 Houthi missiles.
I added that the airstrikes against the Houthis did not deter their
sponsor, Iran, which also escalated tensions in the region over the last
few days by firing missiles at targets in Syria, Iraq, and Pakistan. I
noted that cross-border rocket fire into Israel from Hezbollah, Iran’s
terrorist proxy in Lebanon, is increasing, and attacks on U.S. bases in
Iraq and Syria by Iran-backed militias are continuing.
My Arab TV hosts were dejected after hearing this depressing analysis
and asked what the Biden administration should be doing to counter
increasing aggression by Iran and its proxies.
I replied that President Biden must implement tough and credible
policies against Iran and its proxies as soon as possible. This should
include much more aggressive airstrikes against Houthi missile and drone
sites and against Iran-backed militias that attack U.S. troops in Iraq
and Syria.
The Biden administration should immediately return to President Trump’s tough “Maximum Pressure” sanctions against Iran. This must include fully enforcing oil sanctions against Iran and the end of providing
Tehran with any more multi-billion-dollar sanction waivers, like the
$10 billion sanctions waiver Biden officials quietly gave Iran in
mid-November.
Neither TV host had any further questions after I gave my policy
recommendations. They seemed confused and befuddled about Middle East
security and U.S. policy toward the region.
Disturbingly, this also appears to be Joe Biden’s thinking about the Middle East.
Fred Fleitz is vice-chair of the America First Policy Institute
Center for American Security. He previously served as National Security
Council chief of staff, CIA analyst, and a House Intelligence Committee
staff member.
Xi Jinping wants “reunification” with Taiwan, but this doesn’t imply any notion of consensuality.
The
Taiwanese people have selected a China-defiant candidate, Lai Ching-te,
as new president for the next four years. Now it is time for the free
world to reflect on the interactions between China and Taiwan, examine
China’s track record of peace disruption, and prepare for future China
strategy.
The
Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Xi Jinping projected an
inevitable reunification with Taiwan in his New Year’s address to the
nation on December 31. His address sends a fresh chilling threat to
Taiwan, and particularly to those Taiwanese who have been hoping for a
friendlier, or at least less hostile, relationship with China.
To
be clear, Xi’s “reunification” in this context is a euphemism for a
“take over by force.” This is because China under the CCP will not
abandon its hostile stance on democracy and freedom in the foreseeable
future; Taiwan, on the other hand, would not surrender its freedom to
China without fierce resistance either. Both Taiwan and China
understand the true meaning of the word “reunification” in the context
of the current cross-strait relationship.
In
a bid to reduce the risk of military conflict with China or to postpone
the approaching moment of a China’s invasion of Taiwan, the outgoing
president, Tsai Ing-wen, called on China to help maintain regional peace
in her 2024 New Year’s speech.
Tsai’s
appeal is reasonable to all listening ears, which doesn’t include
China. In fact, history has proven that maintaining peace, be it either
domestic or global, has seldom been on China’s list of considerations.
What China has been doing is quite the opposite, and the list goes way
beyond China’s current aggressions regarding the Philippines and Vietnam
in the South China Sea.
First, on the international stage:
In
1950, less than one year after its establishment and together with the
Soviet Union, China backed North Korea to invade South Korea, which was
an independent nation already recognized by the United Nations back
then. This led to the three-year Korean War, the bloodiest military
conflict since World War II, causing 2–3 million civilian deaths.
In
the 1960s, after being on the receiving end of ideological, financial,
and technological aid from the Soviet Union for decades, a stronger
China decided that it was time to challenge the authoritative status of
its generous patronage, and place itself in the seat of big boss in the
international communist movement. It attacked the Soviet Union
ideologically, and provoked border conflict militarily. China’s actions
led the two communist giants to the brink of nuclear conflict, a dire
situation averted through diplomatic efforts by the United States.
A
decade later in 1979, after Vietnam toppled the Chinese-backed extreme
terror regime Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, China launched a large-scale
invasion of northern Vietnam in the name of “self-defense,” a term used
in a similar context during the Korean War. The impact of the invasion
has tainted China’s relationship with Vietnam to this day.
The
above list covers only large and significant military conflicts.
Several low-profile conflicts are left out for readers to examine for
themselves. These small (but not uneventful) conflicts include: the
1950s annexation of Tibet; the 1962 Indo-China War, and the three major
Taiwan Strait crises (1954-55; 1958; 1995-96).
Domestically, the CCP does not seem to have much appetite for peace, either.
Shortly
after its establishment in 1949, China rolled out its series of
nation-wide brutal campaigns, with each one targeting a specific portion
of the population.
The
campaigns in the 1950s include those against the entrepreneur class,
bureaucrats, the counter-revolutionary, and rich peasants. In the
1960s, old intellectuals and anyone with connection to traditional
Chinese culture found themselves in the crosshairs. In the 1970s, it
was local officials, and anyone who questioned Mao’s personal cult. In
the 1980s and up through today, the enemy is anyone with a curiousness
for liberty. These campaigns have caused tens of millions of deaths in
China.
The
campaign starting in the 1980s is the most ironic one, because to an
outside observer, this is China’s most opened-up period. However in
reality, liberty has been hated during this period as much as it has
ever been since 1949.
One
must have wondered: What has China gained from numerous international
conflicts and constant domestic turbulence? The answer is simple and
mostly unsatisfactory: Not much.
The
Korean War left China with three decades of international isolation
until the U.S. re-established its diplomatic tie with China. The
conflict with the Soviet Union left China with self-deprived access to
the only source of advanced technology for decades. The invasion of
Vietnam left an estimated 26,000 Chinese families with the loss of their
husbands/sons/fathers, and 37,000 more with war-disabled family
members. Similarly, decades of self-inflicted domestic turbulence left
China on the brink of economic collapse, before it decided to open up to
the international community 40 years ago.
But
if one assumes that the above fallouts meant that China is at loss,
then he is wrong. Because each of the above turmoils are bragged about
by the Chinese government as a great success, and the Chinese population
actually buys into these official narratives. The pragmatic China uses
its economic success as the proof—and half of the world that values economic power more than principles has agreed.
With
the assistance of this brief review of China’s peace-disrupting track
record, it becomes clear that “maintaining peace” not only doesn’t make
China’s priority list, it actually often goes against China’s domestic
and international agenda.
Taiwan
has repeatedly extended olive branches to China in the past, only to
have received missile-firing in return. Tsai’s “peace-call” to China,
this time before Taiwan’s latest presidential election, makes no
exception.
China’s
track record of peace disruption, be it domestic or international,
should serve as a wakeup call to countries that still bank on communist
China to initiate and sustain world peace. China, under the CCP’s
iron-fisted rule, should always be regarded as a potential threat to
world peace.
Image: Free image, Pixabay license, no attribution required.
The debate over a Biden nominee affiliated with a center that promotes hate for Israel shows that allegations of anti-Muslim prejudice are attempts to cover up antisemitism.
Islamophobia struck again in the U.S. Senate’s Judiciary Committee this week. Or so we’re supposed to believe. During the confirmation hearings for
Adeel Mangi, a nominee to the Third Circuit of the U.S. Court of
Appeals—one of the courts one rung below the U.S. Supreme Court—Senate
Republicans brought up a jarring entry on his otherwise glittering
résumé that some people think should not be discussed.
Mangi, a Harvard Law School graduate, is a
partner at a large and influential Manhattan law firm. He’s also a
supporter of a laundry list of liberal causes that endear him to
Democrats. That makes him a natural choice for the lifetime appointment
to one of the nation’s most important courts by President Joe Biden. But
Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Tom Cotton (R-Ark.)
thought his role as a former member of the advisory board of Rutgers
University’s Center for Race, Security and Rights was a red flag.
But as far as committee chair Dick Durban
(D-Ill.) was concerned, the GOP’s questions about Mangi were
impermissible, even in the context of a confirmation hearing grilling.
He said that they were evidence of prejudice since Mangi is a
Muslim-American and that the Newark, N.J.-based think tank he was
associated with says its goal is promoting, “the civil and human rights
of America’s diverse Muslim, Arab and South Asian communities.” Sen.
Corey Booker (D-N.J.), compared the quizzing of Mangi to the McCarthyism
of the 1950s.
They weren’t alone in making this claim. TheStar-Ledger in Newark, N.J., editorialized
that the senators who asked Mangi—who, if confirmed, would become the
highest-ranking Muslim-American judge in American history—about his ties
to the center had created an “ugly spectacle” during which they asked
“irrelevant, salacious questions about Israel, Hamas—even whether he
celebrated 9-11.”
This point of view was seconded by letters
read into the record from the Anti-Defamation League and the American
Jewish Committee, organizations that also bashed Republican senators for
badgering Mangi “with endless questions that appear to have been
motivated by bias towards his religion.” The liberal groups—always eager
these days to lend a hand to their political allies on the left and to
virtue signal their belief in interfaith amity—were quick to rise to the
defense of the well-connected Mangi and to consider any questions about
his affiliations or beliefs to be out of bounds.
After the contentious hearing, the
committee approved the nomination by an 11-10 party-line vote. It will
now go to the Senate, where it’s likely that a similar narrow partisan
vote will put Mangi on the Third Circuit.
But there’s more to this controversy than
the usual bitter partisanship that characterizes the efforts of
Republicans and Democrats to pack the federal courts with judges who
conform to their ideological preferences whenever the White House and
the Senate are controlled by the same party. Whether or not Mangi is
confirmed is of lesser importance than the principle that Democrats are
trying to lay down in this controversy.
That’s because once people understand what
the Rutgers Center for Race, Security and Rights is doing, it’s easy to
see that questioning those who support it, as Mangi did until he
resigned in advance of his confirmation hearings, isn’t Islamophobia.
It’s an entirely necessary and reasonable examination of a
state-supported institution that is a prime example of how academia has
become a hotbed of antisemitism and Israel-bashing, both indoctrinating
students in hate and making the lives of Jews on college campuses
intolerable.
An anti-Israel hotbed
The center is a cesspool of anti-Israel
propaganda helmed by a radical Rutgers Law School professor Sahar Aziz,
an avowed opponent of Israel’s existence. It has a record of programs
aimed at delegitimizing the Jewish state and the rights of the Jewish
people, as well as promoting Islamist radicals. Just one among a number
of egregious incidents involved the center holding a 9/11 anniversary
event to provide a platform for supporters of the Palestinian Islamic
Jihad terrorist group.
You don’t have to do a deep dive into its history to see exactly what kind of an organization it is. A glance at the center’s website
provides a quick understanding of its “educational” mission. Who do
they think is the real problem in American foreign policy? That would be
the activities of the “Israel Lobby and its Zionist supporters to shame
and silence critics of Israeli ethnic cleansing and apartheid.” It says
that to label these smears of Israel and Jews (“Zionists”) as
antisemitic is “Islamophobic.”
If there were any doubts about the point
of its goals and practices, they were erased in recent months when it
helped sponsor events at Rutgers in conjunction with the blatantly
antisemitic Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) at which a speaker
denied the Hamas atrocities of Oct. 7. This was part of a pattern of
events that had created a dangerous atmosphere for Jewish students who
were being harassed on the Newark campus, leading to protests from local Jewish groups to demand that Rutgers suspend its SJP chapter. The student group has since been reinstated, though is on probation.
As far as Mangi was concerned, this was
all news to him. He told the senators that he was unaware of the 9/11
event, and deplored Hamas and the terrorist attacks in Israel on Oct. 7.
He claimed that his affiliation with the center was minimal but his
denials don’t pass the smell test. He acknowledged that he joined the
board at the request of Aziz. And his law firm is one of the center’s
financial sponsors.
At the very least, Mangi’s affiliation
with an institution that is part of a movement whose avowed purpose is
opposing Israel—and has repeatedly hosted people affiliated with
terrorist movements and their supporters—is worth questioning. Mort
Klein, national president of the Zionist Organization of America, wasn’t
wrong when he wrote: “If a nominee for a top judicial post asserted
that he was merely a Ku Klux Klan advisory board member, and merely
advised on the KKK’s ‘academic research,’ his nomination would be flatly
rejected.”
But that’s the thing about people who are
connected with groups or institutions that traffic in hate for Israel
and Jews. In the current environment in which the political left has
embraced woke ideology that treats Israel and Jews as “white”
oppressors, places like the Rutgers Center can masquerade as advocates
for human rights when their goals are actually to strip Jews of their
humanity and rights—and ultimately destroy their homeland. Anyone who
dares to bring this up, however, is quickly labeled as an Islamophobe.
Most political liberals, including groups like the ADL that are supposed
to be defending Jews against hate, are so afraid of being accused of
racism and so enamored of the concept of interfaith alliances that they
are ready to excuse ties to such hate groups.
You would think that the events of the
last 100 days following the Oct. 7 Hamas pogroms in Israel and the surge
in worldwide antisemitism, especially on college campuses, that have
arisen since then would have made affiliations with a place like the
Rutgers Center politically radioactive. Yet rather than making them more
sensitive to the cost of turning a blind eye to groups that are part of
this terrible plague of Jew-hatred, the Mangi nomination shows us that
it’s still business as usual for Democratic politicians and liberal
Jewish organizations.
The myth of Islamophobia
In the last 20 years, terrorism apologists
like the Council of American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) have prospered
despite their ties to violent radicals and vicious attacks on Israel and
Jews. They’ve done so by pretending to be a civil-rights group and
promulgating a myth about a post-9/11 backlash against Muslims in the
United States for which there has never been any empirical evidence. FBI
statistics have consistently shown that religious-based hate crimes
against Muslims have never been numerous and are dwarfed by those
against Jews, which continue to be the largest in that category. Still,
that mythical backlash has become widely accepted by the mainstream
media and liberal groups, which have bought into the idea that
Islamophobia is not only rampant in the United States but somehow
comparable to antisemitism.
Jewish groups like the ADL and AJC that
rushed to the defense of someone like Mangi are giving the lie to their
claims to be defending Jews against the hatred that’s become so obvious
since Oct. 7. The ZOA and others, like StopAntisemitism and the Coalition for Jewish Values, that opposed his nomination were right to do so.
All hatred based on religion is to be
deplored. The Mangi nomination battle, however, shows that most of what
is labeled Islamophobia are attempts to call out antisemitism from
Muslims. While American Muslims as a group should not be wrongly labeled
as promoters of Jew-hatred, the agencies that purport to speak for
them—namely, CAIR and institutions that claim to be defending their
rights, like the center at Rutgers—are integral to the movement that has
mainstreamed antisemitism, sending its supporters into the streets and
onto campuses to spread hate against Jews. The lesson here is that in
the current political context, crying “Islamophobia” is just a way to
make us discount that antisemitism, as well as to shut up those trying
to draw attention to a problem that can no longer be ignored.
Jonathan S. Tobin is editor-in-chief of JNS (Jewish News Syndicate). Follow him @jonathans_tobin.
Rather than walking through hundreds of pages of Court decisions, legal pleadings, and law review articles, it’s time for the Final Four Countdown!
There are four major legal actions underway attempting to drive
Donald Trump off ballots and into jail. When we parse the left-wing
legalese and talking points, they translate into one thing: The Left is
petrified that Donald Trump will win, and, when he wins, he’ll go
through the DC Establishment like a firestorm. In a manner of speaking,
all that will remain will bear a strong resemblance to the town of
Lahaina. Rather than walking through hundreds of pages of Court
decisions, legal pleadings, and law review articles, it’s time for the
Final Four Countdown!
Number Four:
I’ve dealt with the Colorado case at length here and here,
so I’ll let you read it for yourself. The short answer is to expect a
9-0 ruling in favor of The Donald from the Supreme Court. You can’t be
guilty of a crime that can’t be defined, such as “insurrection,” when it
is removed from the clash of armies that gave rise to the 14th
Amendment. Defining the crime and prescribing how to handle it is
reserved to Congress in Section 5, so Colorado doesn’t get a say. (Maine
is SOL as well.) And finally, the President is not an officer of the
US. The grammar of the Constitution expressly defines “officers” as
people appointed by the President. Section 3 of the 14th Amendment
doesn’t apply to him.
Number Three:
The Georgia case is a Flagrant 2 foul.
The basis for this assessment is rather simple. Everything Trump is
accused of doing was part of his duty under the Take Care clause of the
Constitution. As Paul Harvey used to say, “Now for the rest of the
story.” It will be a bit “instering,” as my brother says.
Fulton County DA Fani Willis was required by Georgia law
to present her plan to hire “special” prosecutor Nathan Wade to the
Board of County Commissioners for approval. She did not. She hired her
lover, an attorney to be sure, but still a private citizen, contrary to
law. This legally excludes him from participating in Grand Jury
proceedings, discovery depositions, and the like. We might be inclined
to excuse him from knowing her duties, but he failed in his own by not
filing his oath paperwork with the Court in a timely manner. Somehow, he
remembered that simple task a month after the Trump indictment dropped.
Because
SP Wade was not lawfully appointed, everything he touched is tainted.
It’s like a clinker in the punch bowl. There’s no way to clean things
up. It must be thrown out. Legally, it’s an “irreparable defect.” Every
document, interview, and indictment that Wade touched must be excluded
from any trial, ever. Since that’s the whole case, there’s nothing left
for another prosecutor to use against 45.
Number Two:
This is going to be a case of déjà vu
all over again. In the J6 case brought by Jack Smith, former Attorney
General Ed Meese and law professors Steven Calabresi and Gary Lawson
filed an amicus curiae (friend of the Court) brief detailing a major defect
that’s almost a carbon copy of the Georgia case. Not only that, the DC
Court asked questions related to the brief, so they were interested.
I’ll let the amici speak for themselves.
Jack Smith does not have the authority to conduct the underlying
prosecution. Those actions can be taken only by persons properly
appointed as federal officers to properly created federal offices.
Neither Smith nor the position of Special Counsel under which he
purportedly acts meets those criteria.
Jack
Smith is, like Nathan Wade, an attorney. At the time of his
appointment, he was a private citizen. Unlike the Georgia case, AG
Garland did not need to present Smith’s appointment for approval.
Rather, he needed Congress to pass a law creating Smith’s office. Then,
the President would have to nominate him for that office. Without either
of those steps, Jack Smith is not an officer of the federal government.
An alternate would be for the new law to allow the Attorney General to
make the appointment, but that didn’t happen either.
Under current
law, all the AG could do would be to task a sitting US Attorney with
the job, such as with John Huber and John Durham. Instead, Merrick
Garland did a Fani Willis and skated around the Constitution. Now, the amicus brief has him by the short hairs.
Just to complete the hat trick, Smith made the same stupid mistake that Wade made in Georgia. His paperwork was completed after
the Mar-a-Lago indictment was made public under his signature. Just
like Wade, everything Smith touched in the J6 case is now Fruit of the
Poisonous Tree and cannot be lawfully used against the President. As the
amici conclude:
Not properly clothed in the authority of the federal government,
Smith is a modern example of the naked emperor. Illegally appointed, he
has no more authority to represent the United States in this Court, or
in the underlying prosecution, than Tom Brady, Warren Buffett, or
Beyoncé. That fact is sufficient to sink Smith’s prosecution of
Defendant and the Court should vacate the decision below and order that
the prosecution be dismissed.
And now for Number One:
You
can be forgiven if this is a bit anticlimactic because the outcome is
now so obvious. Jack Smith wasn’t involved in the Mar-a-Lago raid, so
the defects in that warrant may have to be tackled a different way. But
he did convene the Grand Jury, which a private citizen like Smith has no
lawful power to do. He had his fingers in a pot full of depositions,
evidence analysis, and so on, tainting the lot. As we noted earlier,
this taint can’t be washed off, painted over, or in any way purified.
Everything he touched must be thrown out.
The fun part of this is
that Trump’s lawyers will almost certainly make the appropriate motions
within a couple of days after Smith gets canned by the DC Court of
Appeals. Jack Smith will then have no standing to even appear in court
in Florida to defend himself, having been kicked to the curb as a
scofflaw. Judge Cannon will have a strong basis for summary dismissal of
the Mar-a-Lago case and a protective order against the use of any of
the evidence in any further prosecution.
Ted Noel, MD is a retired Anesthesiologist/Intensivist who podcasts and
posts on social media as DoctorTed and @vidzette. His Doctor Ted’s
Prescription podcasts are available on many podcast channels.
It would be advisable for the US government to suspend all aid to Pakistan until its government takes concrete steps to free the many victims of its deadly blasphemy laws
"The superintendent of police
stated in his report that neither he nor the eyewitness found any
blasphemy in Shahzad's conversation. His investigation also found that
Shahzad was a minor, illiterate and did not have clear knowledge of any
religion and only repeated words at the direction of Ishtiak Jalali." —
CeCe Heil, Senior Counsel at the American Center for Law and Justice,
July 11, 2023.
"Based on this investigation the police literally said he was not
guilty. He had not committed any blasphemy." — CeCe Heil, July 11,
2023.
"[A]s a juvenile, Shahzad was entitled to be immediately released
on bail and the judge obviously was not going to follow the law.... A
much bigger plan seemed to be in place with the mob controlling the
outcome..... This happens because Muslim fanatics pack courtrooms to
intimidate the judges." — CeCe Heil, July 11, 2023.
According to the organization Open Doors, the persecution of Christians in Pakistan is "extreme"...
It would be advisable for the US government to suspend all
aid to Pakistan until its government takes concrete steps to free the
many victims of its deadly blasphemy laws; persuade Pakistan to
discontinue enforcing them altogether; improve minority rights, and,
most importantly, stop enabling Islamist terrorism.
According to the organization Open Doors, the persecution of
Christians in Pakistan is "extreme". It would be advisable for the US
government to suspend all aid to Pakistan until its government
takes concrete steps to free the many victims of its deadly blasphemy
laws; persuade Pakistan to discontinue enforcing them altogether;
improve minority rights, and, most importantly, stop enabling Islamist
terrorism. Pictured: Thousands of people in Karachi, Pakistan, demand
the execution of Asia Bibi, on November 21, 2018. Bibi, a Christian
woman, spent 8 years on death row because of a false accusation of
blasphemy, before being released and exiled. (Photo by Asif Hassan/AFP
via Getty Images)
Shahzad Masih, a Pakistani Christian, was 16 years old and working in
a hospital as a janitor in 2017, when Muslims falsely accused him of
blasphemy. Since then, has spent more than five years in prison, and has been sentenced to death by hanging for statements he did not even make.
In 2017, authorities arrested Masih after a Muslim coworker and
another man linked with the Islamic terrorist group, Tehreek-e-Taliban
Islami Pakistan (TTIP), accused him of insulting Islam's Prophet
Muhammad. In 2022, a court sentenced Masih to death.
According to Pakistan's blasphemy laws, those deemed to have insulted
Islam or Islam's Prophet Muhammad can be subjected to the death
penalty.
Masih's mother, during testimony at the United Nations, said
that two men accused him of blaspheming against Islam's prophet
Mohammed after unsuccessfully pressuring him into converting to Islam.
Days later, they tried to force him to confess to blasphemy while
recording his voice -- a demand he refused. They then forcibly took him
to a madrassa (Islamic school), where the police arrested him.
The American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) announced that they have mobilized their legal team on the ground to represent Masih and appeal his case, stating:
"We must overturn this vile miscarriage of justice. This
is the ultimate abominable human rights violation, and we'll take this
case all the way to Pakistan's Supreme Court."
Masih's mother added
that she was told by the prison authorities that, as all the other
prisoners are Muslims, her son would not be safe while talking to her in
their presence, so she visits him in an empty room.
"I only meet him for 20 minutes each time... He was a
little child when they arrested him and he's still too young. He's
imprisoned for nothing from the beginning... He is like a bird in a cage
and it's like my son is locked in a cage."
CeCe Heil, Executive Senior Counsel at the ACLJ, said at a UN Human Rights Council event:
"[Shahzad] is completely innocent. He did not commit
blasphemy. He was targeted by Ishtiak Jalali, a member of the fanatical
group, TTIP [Tehreek-e-Taliban Islami Pakistan]. Yet Shahzad's childhood
has been taken from him: he has been in prison since he was only 16.
What you didn't hear from his parents is the complete disregard for
facts, law or justice that occurred in the courtroom.
"Once Shahzad was handed over to the police, they started their
investigation. The superintendent of police stated in his report that
neither he nor the eyewitness found any blasphemy in Shahzad's
conversation. His investigation also found that Shahzad was a minor,
illiterate and did not have clear knowledge of any religion and only
repeated words at the direction of Ishtiak Jalali.
"Based on this investigation the police literally said he was not
guilty. He had not committed any blasphemy. One would think that no
prosecutor would pursue this case any further and no judge would
entertain trying it, but that's not the way false blasphemy charges play
out in Pakistan. Because Shahzad is a Christian, not only did the
prosecutor pursue the case, the judge erroneously tried Shahzad as an
adult, completely ignoring the police investigation findings and
Shahzad's government-issued birth certificate which is required by law
to prevail.
"And why would a judge do this? Why would that be done? Because as a
juvenile, Shahzad was entitled to be immediately released on bail and
the judge obviously was not going to follow the law and release Shahzad.
A much bigger plan seemed to be in place with the mob controlling the
outcome.
"It's common knowledge that in Pakistan trial courts often convict
those accused of blasphemy even when there is no evidence supporting the
convictions. This happens because Muslim fanatics pack courtrooms to
intimidate the judges.
"This is exactly what happened in Shahzad's case. TTIP
[Tehreek-e-Taliban Islami Pakistan] members regularly attended the
hearings, and the leader had the audacity to post a video threatening
that if Shahzad was not convicted, they would kill Shahzad with their
own hands. And on November 22nd, 2022, before the judge
announced the decision that Shahzad was guilty and was sentenced to
death by hanging, TTIP leaders were present in the courthouse. They did a
photo shoot and they left as if they already knew the judge's ruling.
"So, no one who hears the facts of this case could possibly believe
that the rule of law was followed or justice has been done. We have, of
course, filed an appeal to the Lahore High Court, but it could take
years before the appeal is heard.
"Surely, Pakistan cannot think it's adhering to its commitments to
this body and other international agreements by completely ignoring not
only the human rights of Shahzad but his rights under Pakistan's own
laws.
"Pakistan must take immediate steps to right this wrong. This
innocent, young, 16-year-old boy, who is now 22, has already lost his
teenage years sitting in prison. He should not have to lose one more day
wrongfully imprisoned while the courts deny him justice."
In a 2023 written question to the European Commission, a group of members of the European Parliament noted:
"Parliament's resolution of 29 April 2021 on the
blasphemy laws in Pakistan outlines a culture of harassment, violence
and even murder stemming from Pakistan's controversial 1986 blasphemy
laws. The resolution highlights an alarming increase in blasphemy
accusations, which often target Christians.
"False blasphemy accusations hinder Christians from speaking freely
or engaging in religious activities. For instance, in August 2023, a mob
burned 26 churches in Jaranwala, Pakistan, following blasphemy claims."
Meanwhile, the New York Timesreported
that a 2023 bill adopted by Pakistan's parliament further strengthens
the nation's strict blasphemy laws, which are often used to settle
personal scores or persecute minorities, adding:
"Those convicted of insulting the Prophet Muhammad's
wives, companions or close relatives will now face 10 years in prison, a
sentence that can be extended to life, along with a fine of 1 million
rupees, roughly $4,500. It also makes the charge of blasphemy an offense
for which bail is not possible."
These laws can now be used to punish anyone convicted of insulting individuals connected to Islam's founder, Mohammed.
The imprisonment of Masih is not an isolated case. Christians in
Pakistan face growing violence, discrimination, kidnappings, forced
conversions, forced marriages and murder. The government of Pakistan
does nothing to protect them.
A Pakistani Christian mother of five, Asia Bibi, for instance, was
convicted of blasphemy by a Pakistani court and sentenced to death by
hanging in 2010. She was later saved from death row in Pakistan thanks
to international pressure on Pakistan.
According to the organization Open Doors, the persecution of Christians in Pakistan is "extreme":
"Christians in Pakistan are considered second-class
citizens and face discrimination in every aspect of life. Jobs that are
seen as low, dirty and degrading are reserved for Christians by the
authorities....They lack proper representation in politics and although
there were no major attacks against churches last year, there are almost
constant attacks against individuals. Many do not feel safe to worship
freely.
"Pakistan's notorious blasphemy laws target religious minorities
(including Muslim minorities), but affect the Christian minority in
particular –roughly a quarter of all blasphemy accusations target
Christians, who only make up 1.8% of the population. The number of
blasphemy cases is increasing, as is the number of Christian (and other
minority religion) girls being abducted, abused and forcibly converted
to Islam.
"In addition to social hostility, Christians also experience apathy
from the authorities who should protect them. The police force is more
interested in appeasing local strongmen than implementing the law and
protecting minorities. Courts have a slightly better track record in
enforcing the law fairly, but lengthy delays are commonplace. Christians
often languish in prison for years before judgment is handed down, and
it is then too late to bring about change.
"The Christian community feels increasingly trapped between the
Islamic extremist groups that operate in the region, and a government
that appeases these groups. They feel vulnerable without a trusted
authority to protect their rights."
Despite these practices, Pakistan has been one of the top recipients of US foreign aid. From 2001 until the second Obama Administration, Pakistan received billions of dollars
of U.S. military aid. The aid ostensibly had certain goals, such as
assisting Pakistan in fighting terrorism, and developing a democratic
government that would create peace inside the country and with its
neighbors. However, despite billions of dollars towards these aims, none of these goals have been achieved.
As Dr. S Akbar Zaidi of the Carnegie Endowment for Peace wrote in 2011:
"Given the large sums of money that the United States has
invested in aid to Pakistan, assessing the success of these funds
becomes critically important. What becomes clear almost immediately is
that counterterrorism assistance since 2002 has not achieved the
objectives of either the United States or Pakistan. In fact, it is not
entirely clear that the Pakistani military shares the objectives of the
United States, even as it receives billions in military aid.
"There has been little to no oversight of how the funds were actually
spent, even given the potentially divergent goals of the American and
Pakistani militaries. The Pakistani military in fact spent a large
portion of aid funds to purchase conventional military equipment rather
than to fight terrorism or advance U.S. foreign policy aims."
In the nearly 13 years that have passed since Zaidi's report was
published, the security situation and human rights record of Pakistan
has not much improved.
In September 2023, US Rep. Andy Ogles proposed
an amendment to the House of Representatives' annual appropriations
legislation, seeking to bar US aid to Pakistan, in order to discourage
its ongoing crackdown on political dissent. A total of 298
Representatives voted against the proposed amendment, while 132 voted in
favor.
Meanwhile, Pakistan remains a major global center of Islamist terrorism,
a country where blasphemy -- even if one did not commit it -- is a
crime punishable by death, and where religious minorities are severely
persecuted.
Recently, Afghan refugees living in Pakistan -- who fled to escape
the horrors of the Taliban regime in power since the Biden
administration abandoned Afghanistan -- were deported from Pakistan back to Afghanistan.
It would be advisable for the US government to suspend all aid
to Pakistan until its government takes concrete steps to free the many
victims of its deadly blasphemy laws; persuade Pakistan to discontinue
enforcing them altogether; improve minority rights, and, most
importantly, stop enabling Islamist terrorism.
Uzay Bulut, a Turkish journalist, a research fellow
for the Philos Project, and a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Gatestone
Institute.
“We know of no arrests that are made in such cases, nor do we see the P.A. placing any guards in those sensitive locations under regular attack.”
A man lights candles inside Jaffa's St. Peter's
Russian Orthodox Church as Israel's Orthodox Christian communities
celebrate Christmas, Jan. 7, 2024. Photo by Eitan Elhadez-Barak/TPS.
A Palestinian mob caused extensive damage to a Christian holy site in Nablus (Shechem) known as Jacob’s Well on Sunday night.
Christian sources said that Palestinians
from the Balata refugee camp on the outskirts of Nablus armed with guns,
firebombs and stones caused widespread damage to a monastery in the
compound in Balata village, where the well is located.
“Nablus is controlled by the Palestinian
Authority, which fails to help the Christian community and stop the
disturbing pattern of violence against them,” Elias Zarina said.
Zarina is the co-founder and community
manager of the Jerusalemite Initiative, a Jerusalem-based nonprofit that
encourages Arab Christian integration into Israeli society.
The monastery’s keeper, 80-year-old Father
Ioustinos of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate, was not hurt, but he was
traumatized by the violence.
Christians believe that the biblical
Patriarch Jacob purchased the well. The New Testament refers to it as
the Well of Sychar. In 1908, work began on a small Christian compound
that included a church and monastery. For bureaucratic and financial
reasons, construction was only completed in the 1990s.
Local Christian leaders said that Palestinian attacks on their community and holy sites are all too common.
Dr. Naim Khoury, founder of the First Baptist Church in Bethlehem,
said, “It’s not something special in particular, there are many
instances like this everywhere these days, unfortunately, even in
Jerusalem. The whole situation is very unstable and people are
frustrated with the situation. People should pay attention and see
what’s happening. We know very well that no Christian would abuse a
mosque.”
Zarina said, “We know of no arrests that
are made in such cases, nor do we see the P.A. placing any guards in
those sensitive locations that they know are under regular attacks.”
Zarina, who has been researching the Holy Land’s Christian communities, said their population has been dwindling ever since the Oslo Accords brought the P.A into power.
Citing Bethlehem as an example, he said
that in 1993, when the accords were signed, Christians made up 88% of
the city’s residents. Three decades later, Christians now make up 12% of
Bethlehem’s population of roughly 29,000. Most Christians have
emigrated in the face of Muslim extortion, he said.
“It’s not very hard to understand,” Zarina
said. “In Islam, both Christians and Jews are heretics and need to be
dealt with, mostly with violence.”
By insisting on establishing a Palestinian state, Blinken is suggesting not a pathway to peace, but a prize to Hamas and the Palestinians for committing genocide.
By continuing to obsessively
stick to the creation of a Palestinian state, the Biden administration
is actually sending a message to Iran and its terror proxies that
terrorism pays - that if they inflict more pain and casualties on
Israel, the Americans will reward them with a state of their own next to
Israel to facilitate their mission of continuing their Jihadist murder
spree against Jews and finally obliterate Israel.
The poll further showed that if presidential elections were held
today, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh would receive 78% of the vote, as
opposed to only 16% for Abbas.
The poll found that 64% of the Palestinians oppose the idea of a
two-state solution, while 53% support a return to the "armed struggle"
against Israel.
All polls conducted by the same center have consistently shown
that a majority of the Palestinians believe that Hamas is more deserving
of representing them than the PA. This means that if and when a
Palestinian state is established, as the Biden administration is hoping,
it will be ruled by Hamas and its masters in Iran... overlooking the
few miles from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv and Israel's Ben Gurion
International Airport.
The idea that creating another Arab state alongside Israel would
"isolate" or "marginalize" Iran and its proxies is as wrong as it is
dangerous. In reality, the establishment of a Palestinian state on any
part of the West Bank or Gaza Strip would incentivize Iran and its
clients to escalate their Jihad against Israel: it would send them the
message that the more Jews you murder, the more land you get.
[T]his conflict is not about a settlement or a checkpoint or Jerusalem, but about Israel's right to exist in any
form in the Middle East. What Blinken and the Biden administration seem
unable to grasp is that there are still too many people among the
Palestinians, and many other Arabs and Muslims, who have yet to come to
terms with the right of a nation that is not Islamic to remain in its
home in the Middle East.
Blinken is suggesting not a pathway to peace, but a prize to Hamas and the Palestinians for committing genocide.
By continuing to obsessively stick to the creation of a
Palestinian state, the Biden administration is actually sending a
message to Iran and its terror proxies that terrorism pays - that if
they inflict more pain and casualties on Israel, the Americans will
reward them with a state of their own next to Israel to facilitate their
mission of continuing their Jihadist murder spree against Jews and
finally obliterate Israel. Pictured: US Secretary of State Antony
Blinken meets with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in
Amman, Jordan on October 13, 2023. (Photo by Jacquelyn Martin/Pool/AFP
via Getty Images)
As Iran and its proxies in the Middle East are continuing the jihad
(holy war) to murder Jews and eliminate Israel, the Biden administration
has not abandoned their dream of creating a Palestinian terror state on
Israel's doorstep. The last thing the Middle East needs is another
Iran-dominated terror state that would destabilize security and
stability and pose an existential threat to Israel.
In the past few years, everyone has seen how Iran has been working
non-stop to export its Islamic Revolution. With the help of Iran's
proxies in the Gaza Strip (Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad), Lebanon
(Hezbollah), Yemen (Houthis) and Iraq and Syria (multiple militias
operating under various names), Iran's mullahs have consistently
targeted not only Israel and the US, but Arab states such as Saudi
Arabia, Bahrain, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
The mullahs in Tehran are using the Houthi militia to attack and
block Israel-linked ships in the Red Sea. The Houthis have also claimed
responsibility for a number of missile attacks on Israel.
Between 2015 and 2023, the Houthis launched numerous missile and drone attacks on Saudi Arabia from Yemeni territory.
Last year, four Bahraini servicemen were killed in a Houthi drone attack against forces of the Saudi-led coalition in Saudi Arabia near the border with Yemen.
In 2022, the Houthis fired "a large number" of drones and five ballistic missiles at the UAE's Abu Dhabi International Airport and oil refueling vehicles.
In Lebanon, Hezbollah has long been operating as a
state-within-a-state and has dragged the country into a number of wars
that have delivered nothing but ruin to the Lebanese people. In the past
three months, Hezbollah, which is armed and funded by Iran, has been
using the southern part of Lebanon as a launching pad to fire missiles into Israel, thereby increasing the prospects of another round of fighting.
Iran-backed militias in Iraq and Syria, which they previously destroyed with war, continue to fire missiles and drones into Israel and US military bases.
In the Gaza Strip, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad have carried
out thousands of terror attacks against Israel, including firing tens of
thousands of rockets into Israeli towns and cities, and dispatching
suicide bombers to murder women, children and the elderly. This campaign
of terrorism, mainly funded and armed by Iran, reached its peak with
the October 7 massacre of more than 1,200 Israelis.
Were it not for Iran's financial and military aid, much of which came from the Obama and Biden
administrations, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad would not have
been able to accumulate so many weapons and build a vast and
unprecedented network of tunnels in the Gaza Strip. "We will repeat the
October 7 attack, time and again until Israel is annihilated....
Everything we do is justified," promised Hamas official Ghazi Hamad.
The missile and drone attacks on Israel and on ships in the Red Sea have not stopped, as well as at least 137 attacks on US troops in Syria and Iraq just since mid-October. In addition, there is increasing evidence that Iran has been arming and funding
Palestinian terrorist groups also in the West Bank. On January 18,
Israeli security forces killed three terrorists near the West Bank city
of Nablus. The Israeli authorities revealed that the terrorists had received financing and instructions from Iran, as well as terror groups in the Gaza Strip and overseas.
As Israel is fighting Iran-backed terrorists in the West Bank, the
Gaza Strip, Lebanon, Syria and Yemen, the Biden administration appears
to be searching for ways to reward, rather than stop, the regime of the
mullahs in Tehran and their proxies.
According
to the Biden administration, the current war in the Middle East is the
result of Palestinians not having a state of their own. "Creating a
pathway to a Palestinian state is the best way to stabilize the wider
region and isolate Iran and its proxies, US Secretary of State Antony
Blinken said," during his recent tour of the region, according to the Times of Israel.
Speaking to reporters after a meeting with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, Blinken said
the region faced two paths, the first of which would see "Israel
integrated, with security assurances and commitments from regional
countries and as well from the United States, and a Palestinian state --
at least a pathway to get to that state."
The other path, Blinken added, "is to continue to see the terrorism,
the nihilism, the destruction by Hamas, by the Houthis, by Hezbollah,
all backed by Iran. If you pursue the first path ... that's the single
best way to isolate, to marginalize Iran and the proxies that are making
so much trouble -- for us and for pretty much everyone else in the
region."
In Israel, Blinken repeated
the assumption, which actually is false in the extreme, that ending the
violence and tensions could be achieved "through a regional approach
that includes a pathway to a Palestinian state."
By continuing to obsessively stick to the creation of a Palestinian
state, the Biden administration is actually sending a message to Iran
and its terror proxies that terrorism pays - that if they inflict more
pain and casualties on Israel, the Americans will reward them with a
state of their own next to Israel to facilitate their mission of
continuing their Jihadist murder spree against Jews and finally
obliterate Israel.
One does not have to be an expert on Palestinian affairs to know that
a future Palestinian state would be controlled by Palestinians who
reject Israel's right to exist. The most recent public opinion poll
published by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research
showed that since the October 7 massacre, Hamas's popularity has
increased. According to the poll, support for Hamas has more than
tripled in the West Bank compared to three months ago. Support for
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and his Fatah faction has
dropped significantly, with the demand for Abbas's resignation rising to
90%.
The poll
further showed that if presidential elections were held today, Hamas
leader Ismail Haniyeh would receive 78% of the vote, as opposed to only
16% for Abbas.
The poll
found that 64% of the Palestinians oppose the idea of a two-state
solution, while 53% support a return to the "armed struggle" against
Israel.
All polls conducted by the same center have consistently shown that a
majority of the Palestinians believe that Hamas is more deserving of
representing them than the PA. This means that if and when a Palestinian
state is established, as the Biden administration is hoping, it will be
ruled by Hamas and its masters in Iran. It means that Hezbollah,
Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the Houthis and Iran's Islamic Revolutionary
Guard Corps would be overlooking the few miles from Jerusalem to Tel
Aviv and Israel's Ben Gurion International Airport. It would mean
copy-pasting the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip to the West Bank, bringing the
danger to the center of Israel.
The idea that creating another Arab state alongside Israel would
"isolate" or "marginalize" Iran and its proxies is as wrong as it is
dangerous. In reality, the establishment of a Palestinian state on any
part of the West Bank or Gaza Strip would incentivize Iran and its
clients to escalate their Jihad against Israel: it would send them the
message that the more Jews you murder, the more land you get. This is in
addition to the likelihood that the new Palestinian state would be used
as a launching pad to attack Israel.
The mullahs and their proxy terrorists must be laughing as they
listen to Blinken and other US officials discuss the need to establish a
Palestinian state. Such talk makes Americans look utterly oblivious to
the reality of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, namely that this
conflict is not about a settlement or a checkpoint or Jerusalem, but
about Israel's right to exist in any form in the Middle East.
What Blinken and the Biden administration seem unable to grasp is that
there are still too many people among the Palestinians, and many other
Arabs and Muslims, who have yet to come to terms with the right of a
nation that is not Islamic to remain in its home in the Middle East.
Blinken is suggesting not a pathway to peace, but a prize to Hamas and the Palestinians for committing genocide.
Bassam Tawil is a Muslim Arab based in the Middle East.
