Was an EMP Attack Just Tested on the United States?

by Jason Kissner


An unsettling series of events arguably bearing on national security transpired last week that the MSM hastened to paper over. On April 30, the FAA, as a consequence of “computer glitches”, halted outgoing flights at LAX as well as other airports including PHX, SFO, SJC, SLC, LAS, and SAN.

An NBC report May 2 remarked:

A relic from the Cold War appears to have triggered a software glitch at a major air traffic control center in California Wednesday that led to delays and cancellations of hundreds of flights across the country, sources familiar with the incident told NBC News.
On Wednesday at about 2 p.m., according to sources, a U-2 spy plane, the same type of aircraft that flew high-altitude spy missions over Russia 50 years ago, passed through the airspace monitored by the L.A. Air Route Traffic Control Center in Palmdale, Calif. The L.A. Center handles landings and departures at the region’s major airports, including Los Angeles International (LAX), San Diego and Las Vegas.

On May 6, Mac Slavo, writing at SHTFplan (linked at Drudge), followed NBC’s reporting with:

The Air Force officially denied that it was a U-2 spy plane, claiming they found the glitch but provided no reason for what caused it:

It’s still not clear why the U-2 flew into the L.A. Center’s airspace, or why it didn’t give advance warning of the flight, as per usual. According to NBC News, the nearby Edwards Air Force Base and NASA’s Neil A. Armstrong Flight Research Center (located at Edwards) “have been known to host U-2s.”

But an Edwards rep said no such planes are assigned to Edwards, and a NASA rep said that none of their U-2 planes were flying on Wednesday.

The U.S. Air Force, on the other hand, confirmed that it had sent out a U-2 plane that day — but denied to that the spy plane caused the airport confusion. The Air Force Times has more:

Pentagon spokesman Army Col. Steve Warren confirmed that there was a U-2 operating in the area. The Air Force “filed all the proper flight plan paperwork … in accordance with all FAA regulations” and was conducting a routine training operation, Warren said. The FAA has issued a statement saying technicians have “resolved the specific issue that triggered the problem,” but the agency did not say what the problem was. FAA spokeswoman Laura Brown declined to comment about whether the U-2 was connected to the computer problems at the control center.

There is therefore some reason to entertain skepticism with respect to the U-2 explanation.

Perhaps coincidentally, less than 24 hours before the LAX shutdown, passport scanners went haywire at each of the UK’s major airports.

Was this coincidental timing, or, returning to Slavo:

With the revelation this week that Russia has deployed strategic bomber fleets for fly-by’s along our West Coast to gather intelligence and test their capabilities, is it possible that someone flipped a switch to see what would happen?
The Air Force likely knows what caused the outage but refuses to share details, which suggests that either the United States was engaged in a military exercise and they want to keep it under wraps, or, it was the Russians and going public could further inflame the already heated geo-political climate.
Both the United States and Russia have advanced stealth and jamming systems, either of which may have been responsible for the LAX outage. But one particular technology stands out, especially considering that Airforce technicians had to step in to resolve the issue.
The United States, Russia and China have been testing non-nuclear capable electro-magnetic pulse technology that can be deployed either via a missile or a attached to an airplane while it travels in proximity to a particular target. Unlike the nuclear-trigger Super EMP Weapons capable of taking down the electrical infrastructure of an entire country if detonated about 200 miles above the earth’s surface, non-nuclear EMP technology is a line-of-sight weapon that can be directed at a specific city, building or computer system.
In the United States a similar weapon is called CHAMP (High Power Microwave Advanced Missile Project) and is manufactured by Boeing.
We hit every target we wanted to. We prosecuted everyone. Today we made science fiction into science fact.
We took out everything.

Clearly, the U-2 explanation wouldn’t account for the UK glitches. And, it strains credulity to suppose that US military activity would explain the UK glitches.

What does this leave us with? More US government conflicting stories, Russia, and the distinct possibility that the outages were attributable to EMP love taps.

Of course, it could all just be a massive coincidence, but even if it is, there is still a salient point to make. What sane person believes the “flexible” fascist Obama/MSM would tell the truth if it were a hostile EMP test?


Jason Kissner is associate professor of criminology at California State University, Fresno. You can reach him at crimprof2010@hotmail.com.

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2014/05/was_an_emp_attack_just_tested_on_the_united_states.html

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

Deceptive Islamist Support for Nigerian Girls

by Andrew E. Harrod


A coalition of American Muslim leaders came together at a press conference Thursday at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. to condemn Boko Haram's (BH) April 14 kidnapping of 276 Nigerian schoolgirls. Yet the participants' deficient frankness about Islamic doctrine made their denunciations ring hollow.

"Islam is not the problem," insisted Ahmed Bedier, a Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) Tampa chapter founder. "No one is buying their story," Bedier argued with respect to Islamic claims of BH. He dismissed them as "just another con" whose "ideology comes from nowhere" in a country known for scams.

Bedier's assessment might surprise BH's leader, Abubakar Shekau. Known as "Darul Tawheed," an expert in monotheism, Shekau studied under a cleric and then at Borno State College of Legal and Islamic Studies. A profile also describes Shekau's predecessor, deceased BH founder Mohammed Yusuf, as a "charismatic, well-educated cleric who drove a Mercedes as part of his push for a pure Islamic state in Nigeria."

"We didn't ask if Christianity is the problem" with respect to Uganda's brutal Lord's Resistance Army, Bedier analogized. Yet human rights abuses in Islam's name, especially against women and girls, extend beyond Nigeria. Survey results report the "Arab Spring" had a detrimental impact on women, including the reemergence of child marriage in Syria. Women's rights are also a concern in both European Islamic immigrant communities and in Brunei after its recent introduction of sharia law, including stoning for adulterous women.

BH likewise appeared to CAIR-Maryland Vice President Zainab Chaudry as a "vicious cult." BH's "maniacal and suicidal interpretation of Islam" also drew condemnation from Johari Abdul-Malik, an imam at northern Virginia's Dar al-Hijrah mosque. BH is "madness masquerading as religion," Imam Mahdi Bray agreed, and its crimes violate "core Islamic teachings," said Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC) analyst Hoda Elshishtawy.

"We need to unite across all faith lines," Bray said, with ecumenical concern for the kidnapping victims, "until all our girls are brought home."

Bedier and others considered BH violence symptomatic of Nigerian social ills like poverty. Martin Luther King, a "drum major for justice," likewise came to Bray's mind during an interview. King was "standing up for the poor and the oppressed" with jobs and education. Nigerian government response to the kidnappings, meanwhile, reminded Bedier of American "outrage" following official American handling of Hurricane Katrina.

"Education is one of the greatest counter-terrorism programs," said Abdul-Malik. Punning BH's Hausa slang meaning of "Western education is sin [haram]," Hakeem Kareem from the National Council of Nigerian Muslim Organizations called "Western education…Boko Halal" or permitted. Kareem referenced Nigerian Muslim doctors involved in disease eradication.

Other areas of the world, meanwhile, suffer from poverty, such as Haiti, still rebuilding from the 2010 earthquake which killed at least 250,000 people and displaced another 1.5 million. Yet somehow these countries do not devolve into misogynist paradises for "vicious cults."

The presenters rejected any questions about Islam's treatment of women as beyond the event's purview, even though Boko Haram announced plans condemned by the speakers to force its captives into sexual relationships or even "marriages." BH's actions paralleled Islamic doctrine justifying child marriage that had blocked in Nigeria's Muslim-majority northern states from implementing legislation for an 18-year-old age of consent for marriage. By contrast, Nigeria's Christian-majority southern states passed such legislation.

Although Bedier called for Americans to "use our resources for something that is positive," he offered few specifics. He advocated drone use in Nigeria "for surveillance," not combat. Noting that BH sometimes outgunned government forces, Bray suggested that America aid Nigeria with intelligence and the FBI's hostage rescue team along with the United Nations.

Nigerian Christian leaders have identified most of the kidnapped girls as Christian, corresponding to BH's targeting of Nigerian Christians to create Muslim-ruled regions. This sectarian divide, and not any religiously neutral socioeconomic deprivation often cited by American officials, has motivated BH, Christian human rights advocates have long contended (see here and here). Yet, the online conference announcement described the "kidnapping of Muslim girls." Abdul-Malik called that a mistake.

He noted that BH, as a "takfiri" group with a "medieval, feudal perspective," also targets Muslim opponents as apostates. He had no interest, however, in the "mission creep" of questions concerning traditional Islamic death penalties for apostasy/blasphemy recurring in the modern world.

Boko Haram has been massacring Christians and other foes for years, yet only a crime shocking the world attracted the attention of these American-Islamist groups. A blogger's search of CAIR's website, for example, revealed only one entry for BH (post-press conference, two). CAIR condemned a 2011 bombing, but Chaudry claimed CAIR's "focus is not international" as a "domestic organization." Such domesticity, though, has not prevented CAIR from criticizing Israeli military action, or from defending Muslim Brotherhood leaders in Egypt, something Chaudry did not feel at liberty to address. Chaudry also refrained from addressing child marriage in Nigeria, something not supported by Islam according to her assertions.

Speakers at Thursday's news conference hardly reassured that they would adequately address the Islamic dangers posed in Nigeria by movements like BH. Not for nothing does BH's "formal Arabic name" mean Jam'at Ahl as-Sunnah lid-da'wa wal-Jihad, or "The Fellowship of the People of the Tradition for Preaching and Holy War," Islam apostate and critic Ayaan Hirsi Ali observes.

As the Canadian Muslim reformer Tarek Fatah notes, wartime sex slavery does find sanction in Islamic sources, highlighting the need for open discussion of Islam's various controversies. "We either develop the maturity to say, such Islamic injunctions do not apply anymore," Fatah writes, "or we can keep on driving fast-forward in reverse gear…every time we hit an obstacle that appears in our blind spot, we can blame it on 'Islamophobia.'"

Those at Thursday's news conference chose the latter.

"There is a time when silence is betrayal," Bray quoted King, a comment applicable to the press conference itself.


Andrew E. Harrod

Source: http://www.investigativeproject.org/4381/deceptive-islamist-support-for-nigerian-girls

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

Wanted: A Pro-active Aliyah Policy

by Yoram Ettinger

A pro-active aliyah policy was Israel's most effective engine of growth and posture of deterrence. It catapulted the Jewish state from 650,000 Jews in 1948 to 6.5 million in 2014, from a $1.5 billion economy in 1948 to $300 billion in 2014, from a country devoid of technology in 1948 to a commercial and defense technology powerhouse in 2014 (second only to the U.S.), from an insignificant military power in 1948 to a leading global military power in 2014, from a misperceived strategic liability in 1948 to the most reliable and capable ally of the U.S. in 2014.

All Israeli prime ministers, from David Ben-Gurion (starting in 1948) through Yitzhak Shamir (ending in 1992), enforced a pro-active aliyah policy in defiance of the demographic and bureaucratic establishments, crowning aliyah as Israel's top national priority. They followed in the footsteps of most of the Zionist leaders from the late 19th century, who realized that aliyah was the soul, flesh and lifeline for the reconstruction of the Jewish state in the Land of Israel.

 

They did not engage in reactive policy, which would focus their attention on the absorption of the olim (Jewish immigrants to Israel). Rather, they were preoccupied with a pro-active policy, generating waves of aliyah in the aftermath of the wars of 1948 to 1949 (from Arab countries), 1956 (from Poland) and 1967 (from the USSR and Eastern Europe), in the early 1960s (from Morocco) and the 1970s (from the USSR and Eastern Europe), from 1950 through 1995 (from Romania), during the 1980s and early 1990s (from Ethiopia) and during the 1990s (from the USSR). The groundwork for the arrival of one million olim during the 1990s was carried out by Prime Minister Shamir during the late 1980s and early 1990s.

 

Thus, they triggered waves of aliyah totaling 3.5 million Jews, leveraging windows of opportunities, caused by ideological, social, economic, military, diplomatic and political regional and global developments in Israel, the Arab World, the USSR, Eastern Europe, Argentina and the U.S. (the U.S. Congress played a critical role in liberalizing Soviet emigration policy). While most of the 3.5 million Jews aspired to emigrate anyway, it was Israel's pro-active policy which facilitated emigration and guided them to the Jewish state, rather than to the U.S., Europe, Canada or Australia. It was Shamir's pro-active aliyah policy (such as pressuring the U.S. to stop issuing refugee certificates to Soviet Jews, and recruiting the U.S. Senate to pressure Moscow to allow Jewish emigrants to fly only to Israel), which eliminated the 80 percent dropout rate of Soviet Jews, who used to emigrate from the USSR but avoided Israel. The pro-active aliyah policy was responsible for Israel's unprecedented growth, surging the Jewish state to the top of the OECD countries, demographically, economically, scientifically, technologically, medically, educationally, agriculturally and militarily. Without the pro-active aliyah policy, the Jewish state would not have qualified for OECD membership, and possibly would not have survived the lethal challenges of the last 66 years.

 

In contrast to their predecessors, all Israeli prime ministers since 1992 have refrained from a pro-active aliyah policy, thus depriving Israel of its most effective engine of growth and posture of deterrence. They have relegated aliyah to a secondary national priority, subordinating the long-term Zionist vision to pessimistic assessments by the demographic and bureaucratic establishments, whose projections systematically precluded aliyah waves on security, economic, cultural and educational grounds. Hence, recent Israeli prime ministers have limited their aliyah policy to an annual increase of a few thousand olim, rather than leveraging the current window of opportunity, which lends itself to another substantial wave of aliyah.

 

Currently, there is a rare window of opportunity for a dramatic wave of aliyah of at least 500,000 Jews during the next 10 years from Russia, Ukraine, Hungary, Argentina, and Western democracies such as Germany, France, England and the U.S., which feature a significant infrastructure of aliyah-oriented Jewish/Zionist education. That window of opportunity consists of the relative strength of Israel's economy; the confidence demonstrated by global high-tech giants in Israel's long-term viability (such as Intel's recent $6 billion expansion of its already robust Israeli presence); the sustained global economic uncertainty; the moderate (or no) cost of Jewish education in Israel; the rising threat of Islamic terrorism throughout the world; Israel's success in drastically curtailing Palestinian terrorism; the expansion of Islamic presence in European countries with substantial Jewish communities; the intensification of anti-Semitism; and the growing uncertainty in Russia and Ukraine.

 

A pro-active aliyah policy requires the appointment of several country-dedicated task forces, headed by charismatic personalities and composed of experts in the areas of aliyah generation and absorption, including the construction of employment, housing, transportation, telecommunications, education, health and medical infrastructures, as well as the passage of statutes and laws facilitating the swift integration of arriving engineers, doctors, scientists, lawyers and other professionals into the Israeli market.

 

A failure by the Israeli government to leverage the unique window of aliyah opportunity -- producing an aliyah wave of at least 500,000 olim during the next 10 years -- would haunt its leaders, adding a chapter of infamy to Jewish history.

Yoram Ettinger

Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=8329

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

If Mahmoud Abbas Had a Palestinian State

by Reuven Berko



Al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri recently called Mahmoud Abbas "a traitor who is selling Palestine." The statement was made in a speech available on al-Qaida-affiliated websites, and he also said that while Fatah claimed to be a national liberation movement, it had in fact become the movement that was selling out the homeland, and that its president had waived the rights of the refugees to appease the United States.
Shortly after the speech was made public, top Fatah members called al-Zawahiri a hypocrite. They accused him of trying, "in the service of the Zionist plot," to cause a rift within the Palestinian people at a time when Mahmoud Abbas was facing threats and pressure to surrender to American and Israeli demands. Fatah spokesman Ahmed Assaf accused al-Qaida of never having taken an interest in the Palestinian cause, and although the entire world was their battlefield, it had not carried out so much as one action against the Israeli occupation.

Al-Zawahiri's accusations reflect the atmosphere of failure surrounding Abbas and his supporters after the last round of negotiations with Israel, and are an omen for the future. Something upset the Palestinian leadership's recent sense of euphoria, and the situation is such that Abbas has threatened to resign, dismantle the Palestinian Authority and turn everything over to Israel.

Until just recently, Abbas and his supporters were convinced they could link the European Union's pressure on Israel to the American effort brokered by Secretary of State John Kerry to twist Israel's arm and force it to make further concessions toward establishing a "Palestinian state," without the Palestinians having to concede anything. The Palestinian tactic was inherited from Yasser Arafat, author of the "salami plan" to dismantle Israel slice by slice, an illustration of the Arabic saying "khuz watalib," "Take and demand more." The Palestinians had aspirations to obtain a state without having to pay Israel any price that the Palestinian, Arab and Islamic streets might consider "unfavorable." The illusion of exploiting the negotiations' momentum and getting "Palestine" for free was joined by the Israeli left's cry of "gevalt," lest Israel's not caving in to the Palestinians' demands would immediately lead to the third Intifada, to sanctions, to forcing Israel to become a binational state or, heaven forbid, to Mahmoud Abbas' resignation, which would leave Israel to deal with the chaos in Judea and Samaria alone.

In response to the Palestinian mantra of "Take and demand more," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu formulated his own mantra, "Give and you will get, don't give and you won't get." In the meantime and quite unexpectedly, the Palestinians had the global media rug pulled out from under them and were forced to the sidelines by the talks with nuclear Iran, the drama unfolding in Ukraine, and the ongoing slaughter in Syria. Israel's firm position on the issue of its Jewish character put the Palestinians in a vise. They are now at a crossroads, where accepting Israel as a Jewish state will write "finis" to the so-called "right of return" (the "right" of all the descendants of the Palestinian refugees to return to the territory of the State of Israel), and will of necessity lead to the end of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The last round of talks made it clear that Abbas and the rest of the Palestinian leadership reject a peace agreement with Israel and the establishment of a Palestinian state, and are manipulating marginal technical excuses. The threats, veiled or not, by radical Islamists (such as those made by al-Zawahiri) and a quick look at Arab-Muslim world, especially Syria, have made it clear to the Palestinians what the future has in store for them, and it now appears that in the meantime, they prefer the status quo to the establishment of an independent Palestinian state. Thus, it is easy to understand why the negotiations with Israel have faltered and stalled.

Abbas and his advisers are gradually abandoning the illusion that Israel will agree to commit suicide just to please them and are beginning to realize that Israel will never accept the descendants of the original refugees who fled in 1948, to say nothing of the jihadists who will try to hitch a ride on the so-called "right of return." Abbas knows that if the Palestinians really do decide to establish an independent state alongside Israel, as part of the peace agreement they will have to accept all those descendants. That is a message Abbas will never be able to send to the Palestinians in the "dispersal." If he agrees to the condition that there will be no "right of return" into Israeli territory, the future Palestinian state will have to allow the millions of Palestinian descendants spread around the globe to enter "Palestine" and claim Palestinian citizenship. Legions of them will do so to escape the poverty, slaughter, racism and discrimination that have been their lot in the poverty-stricken, conflict-ridden Arab states in which they have lived for years, where they are second-class residents with neither citizenship nor basic civil rights.

The Palestinian leadership knows that if their demand for Palestinian control of the Jordan Valley crossings were accepted, the operative result would be floods of people seeking entrance into "liberated Palestine." They know that among them would be operatives of all the Palestinian terrorist organizations, to say nothing of the armed jihadists currently active in the Arab-Muslim world, especially in Syria, Iraq and Lebanon, who would stream in "to liberate all Palestine." The new Palestinian state would have no grounds to refuse entrance to the "jihad heroes," or to close its borders to all those attracted by the prosperity in Judea and Samaria, or to those who hoped to enter Israel or to those who intended use "Palestine" as a convenient base from which to attack Israel.

The Palestinian leadership, which is supposed to establish a Palestinian state alongside Israel in the West Bank, understands that what is happening in Syria, i.e. the destruction caused by the Islamic organizations fighting there, will be replicated in the new Palestinian state itself. Simple observation of the activities of al-Qaida-affiliated organizations in Syria, among them the Al-Nusra Front and the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, reveals that they are on a rampage of murder, rape and robbery, and that innocent civilians are their hapless victims. In addition, the Palestinian leadership has not forgotten how its people were killed and thrown from the roofs in the Gaza Strip as Hamas took over, not a particularly encouraging lesson.

In addition, the masses that stream into "Palestine" will demand a role in government and will clash with Palestinian property owners and demand that resources be reapportioned. Jihad fighters who enter Judea and Samaria in the name of the "right of return" will use force to introduce a lifestyle based on the Sharia, and with Hamas will begin a revolution that will end with the establishment of an Islamic emirate alongside the one in the Gaza Strip. Later, the Islamist terrorist organizations will quarrel among themselves and vie for control of the territory (exactly like what is happening now in Syria, where the Islamist organizations war with one another as they fight to wrest control from Bashar Assad), even as they wage a military confrontation with Israel.

This scenario will inevitably lead to the end of Palestinian security collaboration with Israel, which the Palestinian Authority currently enjoys and which serves its interests. The final act will be the internal destruction of the Palestinian Authority, crowned by the hanging of Abbas and those close to him, after which their bodies will be dragged to the main square in Ramallah. The property of the corrupt upper echelons of Fatah will be confiscated – property they stole and money they embezzled from Western and Arab aid funds which were originally intended for projects for the Palestinians.

After that, Hamas and the Salafist-jihadi organizations will force themselves on the local population, but the battles between the Palestinian and Islamist organizations will give rise to chaos and destruction within Palestinian territory, mass murders and the destruction of the infrastructure built when the West Bank was under Israeli control. The Islamists, some of them jihad tourists from other killing fields, will wreak havoc among Palestinians civilians, their property and their women exactly as they are currently doing in Syria. Terrorist attacks on Israel will increase and Israel will respond with increasing violence and the almost-flowering Palestinian territory, currently neighboring on Israel, will become a wasteland, sharing the fate of the cities of the Arab Spring. As usual, Israel will be held responsible for the internal Palestinian slaughter, just as it was held responsible for the slaughter of the Palestinians by the Maronites in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in Beirut.

Abbas conducted negotiations in an attempt to wrest tactical gains from Israel in order to preserve the momentum, extend his rule (which is neither legal nor supported by a Palestinian consensus) and wait until a better opportunity presents itself to act against Israel, for, according to the Arab saying, "Allah favors the patient." Abbas wants neither peace nor an independent Palestinian state because it would mean the end of the conflict with Israel and the establishment of a state coexisting with Israel, the recognition of Israel as legitimate and as a Jewish state. That result goes against Palestinian interests and is an infallible recipe for the internal destruction of the Palestinian Authority. The establishment of a Palestinian state coexisting with Israel will shatter the newborn Palestinian dream of the "return," the expulsion of the Jews, and the takeover of all "Palestine."

Actually, Abbas does not want an independent Palestinian state under any conditions. An independent Palestinian state would entail free and democratic elections, which he and his associates would lose to Hamas. An independent Palestinian state would need Palestinian leaders who would finally have to take responsibility for their citizens without being able to blame the "occupation" for their own failures. An independent Palestinian state would have to end the embezzlement of funds and force the introduction of an independent economy with fiscal transparency. The establishment of a Palestinian state would end the massive influx of Arab and Western resources delivered in the name of "the Palestinian cause."

The government in the Palestinian state would be forced to prevent the return of the descendants of the original Palestinian refugees even to "liberated Palestine" because of limitations of security, economy and territory. This action will enrage and cause antagonism among those who will not be allowed to settle in "Palestine." The Palestinian state will also have to find a way to deal with the Gaza Strip, whose population suffers from every form of socio-economic backwardness and is completely different from the population of the West Bank. It will have to cope with Hamas, the dominant factor in the Gaza Strip, which is belligerent and hostile to the other Palestinian organizations and their supporters. Hamas will use force to Islamize the secular lifestyle of the Palestinians in the West Bank, just as it has in the Gaza Strip.

Establishing a state side by side with Israel is not good for the Palestinians. The Palestinian Authority's situation will deteriorate even further if Israel abandons the Jordan Valley border and turns it over to the Palestinians. Abbas is trying to squeeze interim concessions out of Israel as a way of maintaining his regime's momentum and convincing the Palestinians, an increasing number of whom support Hamas and the Salafist-jihadis in their campaign against Israel and the West and do not want a Palestinian state that will live in peaceful coexistence with Israel, that he has actually achieved something. Secretary of State John Kerry is to be congratulated on his efforts to bring peace to Israel and the Palestinians, but as far as Abbas and his followers are concerned, the vision of establishing a Palestinian state is like the work of recently-deceased Gabriel Garcia Marquez, a "chronicle of a death foretold."

Pursuing a policy of brinkmanship, the Palestinians instituted moves for an international boycott of Israel, increasing the tension and violence on the ground, and also asked for recognition and the status of a national state in various UN agencies, violating agreements with Israel. In addition, Abbas threatened to resign, dismantle the Palestinian Authority and make Israel responsible for the fate of the Palestinians in Judea and Samaria. His threats were virtually unnoticed and had no effect.

The need for a Palestinian decision to recognize Israel as a Jewish state and abandon the so-called "right of return" was raised in the negotiations Kerry brokered. It is a just, legitimate demand, and it became an obvious and accepted condition for ending the conflict, achieving peace and establishing a Palestinian state. Abbas refused, and his refusal meshed with the ideology of Hamas, an arrogant Palestinian terrorist organization that not only rejects any peace agreement with Israel, but is committed to destroying it. Internal Palestinian reconciliation became attractive to Hamas because of its precarious position, having lost the support of Syria, Iran and Hizballah. In addition, Hamas has been outlawed by Egypt as a terrorist organization and is being pursued as such. The Egyptian army has destroyed 1,400 smuggling tunnels under the border at Rafah, which served to provide Hamas with ammunition, logistics and funding for its terrorist activities.

Thus, at the end of April, the PLO and Hamas held a series of meetings in the Shati refugee camp near Gaza City. They pieced together a unity agreement on the only single common factor of their totally different ideologies, which is seeking Israel's destruction and the establishment of a Palestinian state in its place, but until recently they disagreed over authority and the way to realize their dream. The agreement reached included the formation of an interim government of "technocrats," elections, and processing a joint new national agenda that would crystalize and express both sides' "national and religious" aspirations. Nevertheless President Mahmoud Abbas claims that he will continue supporting the negotiations with Israel, but his new-found ally Ismail Haniyeh, who is head of the terrorist administration in the Gaza Strip, insists on establishing a Palestinian state on "all the land of Palestine."

Now one can only hope that the Americans finally understand with whom they are dealing. Only the future will tell if the dog is wagging its tail or if the tail is wagging the dog.

Dr. Reuven Berko has a Ph.D. in Middle East studies, is a commentator on Israeli Arabic TV programs, writes for the Israeli daily newspaper Israel Hayom and is considered one of Israel's top experts on Arab affairs.


Reuven Berko

Source: http://www.investigativeproject.org/4378/guest-column-if-mahmoud-abbas-had-a-palestinian

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

Saudi Columnist: The Jihad In Syria Is Jihad For Satan, Not Allah

by MEMRI


On March 26, 2014, a video was posted on YouTube showing two Saudi youths being executed by Jabhat Al-Nusra (JN) on charges of fighting for the rival jihad group, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).[1] In response, Saudi columnist Dr. Muhammad Al-Harbi published an article in the Saudi daily 'Okaz in which he harshly attacked the phenomenon of Saudi youths traveling to wage jihad in Syria.

Al-Harbi claimed that the fighting in Syria was not jihad for the sake of Allah but rather "jihad for the sake of Satan" and a deviation from Islam. He condemned the preachers and clerics who urge the youth to travel to Syria, accusing them of exploiting the naivety of these youths and their desire to carry out jihad. These clerics, he said, push the youths to join a war they have nothing to do with and provide the extremist terrorist organizations that are fighting each other in Syria with cannon fodder in the form of young fighters from Saudi Arabia and other countries. Al-Harbi called on the Saudi authorities to not make do with the Munasaha program (which provides guidance to mujahideen returning from foreign jihad fronts) but rather to establish an entire system in the Saudi mosques, schools and media to fight extremism and quench it "with an iron fist."

The following are excerpts from the article:[2]

Dr. Muhammad Al-Harbi (image: Al-Riyadh, Saudi Arabia)

Death In Syria Is Death For The Sake Of Satan; Allah Forbade Waging War Against Our Fellow Muslims

"'Abd Al-Rahman Al-Shumari and Hamoud Al-Saqri, two Saudi youths from Riyadh, were executed in cold blood and in the most heinous of ways. [Their execution] was filmed in order to burn sorrow into the hearts of their parents, families, loved ones, homeland, and the [entire] human race for the rest of their lives.

"Who killed 'Abd Al-Rahman and Hamoud? Did they fight alongside ISIS and were killed by JN, or was it the other way around? Did they fight alongside the Free Syrian Army and were killed by [Syrian] regime soldiers, or was it the other way around? Did they fight alongside Hizbullah and were killed by Al-Qaeda, or was it the other way around?

"It doesn't matter who the two fought for in Syria, and it doesn't matter what organization their killers belong to. What matters is that the two were killed, liquidated! All those who delude themselves [into believing] that Syria is the site of jihad for the sake of Allah will be liquidated this way – because death in Syria is death for the sake of Satan, definitely not for the sake of Allah! Because Allah never commanded us to fight our coreligionists without just cause."

Preachers And Sheikhs Steal Young People's Minds, Toy With Their Faith

"The leaked YouTube video of 'Abd Al-Rahman and Hamoud's execution in Syria revealed the ugly face [of what awaits] those who continue to believe that the jihad there is jihad for the sake of Allah... and the ugly faces of those who preach fitna [civil strife] and encourage the [idea] of death and forbidden bloodshed [i.e. the killing of Muslims]. Furthermore, [the video] revealed the despicable and evil side of those who seduce the youth in order to steal their souls... having pushed them into a war they have nothing to do with and having sold their lives cheaply for a cause that is unjust, especially since their blood, spilled on Syrian soil, achieves no justice over there, in any way!!

"The leaked YouTube video also revealed that those fighting in Syria are Muslims who have deviated from just Islam in their thinking, and have become nothing but pawns in the hands of extremist terrorist organizations who falsely and deceptively don the cloak of religion. These organizations fight amongst themselves and require human shields and victims imported from our country and others, who are easily smuggled to them by false preachers and sheikhs... The satellite channels and social networks open their doors to [these preachers and sheikhs] so they can incite, steal young minds, and toy with [the young people's] faith, while exploiting their desire to attain 'the pinnacle of Islam' [i.e. jihad]. And indeed, [these youths] go there blindly and without thinking, leaving behind wounded mothers and wives, sons and daughters, who are doomed to be orphaned and face perdition.

"Muslims kill fellow Muslims while their real enemy is a few kilometers away, in Israel! Right there in the occupied Syrian Golan! But they do not dare fire a single bullet at it because they are cowards and collaborators, and are betraying their religion, countries, nation, and humanity!! Not just because [Israel] is stronger than they are, but because [Israel] is not [even] part of their priorities and because those who initially incited them work towards the success of the Zionist enterprise in the region. This is the truth, whether you like it or not."

We Require A Total War Against Extremism

"The false jihad in Syria was never anything but death for the sake of Satan, and was never [jihad] for the sake of Allah. To prevent [the events shown in] this tragic video from recurring, we must urgently establish an entire system to fight this deviant idea that led 'Abd Al-Rahman and Hamoud [to Syria]. It is not enough to send them messages via the media to return [home], and it is not enough to [implement] the counseling [program] for those returning [from jihad fronts]. Rather, we must immediately act in the homes, mosques and schools.

"Every father and mother should be aware of their responsibility to watch their children, educate them, condemn extremist thought on their part, keep an eye on their circle of friends and help them choose [their friends]. Furthermore, there is no escaping [the need to] reexamine the education system and focus on retraining teachers before developing or changing the curricula. We must [also] choose mosque preachers well and follow their sermons, restrain all those who preach fitna and encourage [their followers] to travel abroad for wars, and prevent their appearance on satellite channels and media outlets. As we all know, prevention is better than treatment, and therefore we must formulate a plan to combat deviant thought [and fight it] with an iron fist."

Endnotes:

[1] Youtu.be/Z6hsGBNRiX0, March 26, 2014.

[2] 'Okaz (Saudi Arabia), April 5, 2014.

MEMRI

Source: http://www.memri.org/report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/7973.htm

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

When Celebrity Politics Died

by Geoffrey P. Hunt

Tragedy often befalls fascination.  A day hiker falls to his death from a slippery overhang while peering down at a spectacular waterfall.  A child is swept into the breaking swells of the incoming tide while playing too close to the edge of an ocean-rinsed granite ledge.

Yet as Auden wrote in “Musée Des Beaux Arts”:

In Breughel's Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away
Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may
Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry,
But for him it was not an important failure…

Four dead Americans in Benghazi.  No one responsible cares.  Dude.

Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer's horse
Scratches its innocent behind on a tree.

And a nation reaps tragedy from fascination in choosing a president because of his captivating celebrity, the color of his skin, and his speaking style.  Nothing else.  And we are expected to move on.  A black man as president, check.  Next up, a woman.

The serial fascination with celebrity politics – or, if you prefer, identity politics – moving on from race to gender, has appeared seamless as Hillary Clinton, with fragrant garlands inevitability headlining her trellis, has been anointed to succeed Barack Obama.  The electorate saddled up to ride another identity pony has been undeterred by the fiascos of the Obama presidency, either not paying attention or expecting something different the next time around.

An economy in shambles, historic joblessness, legislative debacles, constitutional breaches, the ObamaCare catastrophe, and abject foreign policy meltdowns – all of this is accented by increasing distrust in big government from IRS, Department of Justice, and NSA domestic spying scandals.  Wrapped in dissembling and divisiveness — the hallmarks of the Obama presidency — flippantly dismissed by the mainstream opinion-makers who have escorted Hillary as the next celebrity darling to redo all of it.  Or repeat all of it.

Until Benghazi.  Benghazi not only was the place where four Americans were murdered.  Benghazi was the place where celebrity died, marked by cowardice, incompetence, complicity, and casual disregard of duty.

Until Benghazi, Hillary requited the fascination with her as the rightful celebrity next in line for the White House.  Unable to claim any accomplishments, despite the apparition of an impressive résumé, Hillary at least avoided having to account for any monumental screw-ups.  After all, celebrities don’t have to be accountable for anything other than sustaining their celebrity.  Until Benghazi.

With the job as secretary of state, her first having direct consequential authority, Hillary failed at due diligence, the most fundamental task of statecraft.  This was no miscalculated act of omission.  This was pre-mediated amnesia.  Hillary would prefer us to believe she was disengaged from the decision-making chain with Benghazi – just another tiresome detail buried amongst dozens of similarly trivial chores, flyspeck annoyances unfit to merit a one-line entry in her million-mile travelogue.

Fascination with celebrity politics, where glamor, virtue-speak, and cosmetic posturing have displaced any notion of authentic leadership, had its beginnings with JFK, taking a breather until the Bill Clinton years.  George W. Bush’s failure to draw bipartisan support, in part, was due to his antipathy towards celebrity.

In former times, leadership was the ability to mobilize complex forces in resolving conflict, protecting the sovereign integrity of the nation.  But no longer.  We have lately defined leadership as mobilizing adolescent emotions for shallow, fleeting, and overwrought causes, where oratory has a higher purpose than action.  Where campaign fashion – pant creases and manicures – and high-stepping the ascending platform towards the teleprompter triumph over moral courage.

Great presidents and statesmen resolve conflicts.  Conflicts where resolutions are unclear, uncertain, and nearly impossible to imagine, accompanied by perilous threats to one’s reputation and legacy.  That is why FDR, Truman, Eisenhower, Reagan, Polk, Lincoln, Jefferson, and Washington occupy the mantle.  Presidents who dither, demur from duty, or delegate valor join the likes of James Buchanan and Barack Obama in the unredeemable landfill of history.

Obama’s conduct the night of the paramilitary terrorist assault was despicable enough – AWOL as usual, designed to insulate him from his national security nihilism in the midst of his re-election auction.  But Hillary was supposed to be better, more engaged, tougher-minded, the architect of “smart power.”  Instead she abandoned any pretense of statesmanlike leadership, calculating the most plausible deniability to best suit her own next election campaign.

Of course, it is increasingly obvious that Hillary either engineered or eagerly participated in a crude and disgraceful cover-up, lied about her complicity to sustain a self-serving political narrative, and most egregiously dismissed the intelligence of the American people while insulting the families of the assassinated ambassador Stevens, along with his brave dead colleagues Woods, Doherty, and Smith.

Hillary’s ascension died that night in Benghazi.  Stalled not by a glass ceiling, but by a bloody battle waged on the consulate compound and CIA Annex rooftop.  The celebrity-in-waiting couldn’t be bothered.  Stevens's, Woods's, Doherty's, and Smith’s deaths will not have been in vain if celebrity politics also expired that night.

Geoffrey P. Hunt

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/2014/05/when_celebrity_politics_died.html

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

PM: Refusal to Recognize Israel as Jewish is the Root of the Conflict

by Shlomo Cesana and Gideon Allon

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tells Likud Convention he plans to promote legislation that defines Israel as Jewish and democratic, leaving no room for claims otherwise • Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon says Hamas-Fatah deal unlikely to work.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

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Photo credit: Yossi Zeliger

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu | Photo credit: Yossi Zeliger

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated on Wednesday that the core of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the refusal to recognize Israel as the national homeland of the Jewish people.

"The conflict has been ongoing for 90 years," Netanyahu said at the Likud Convention in Tel Aviv. "It is not continuing because of the settlements, because of the territories -- it exists and continues because of the ongoing refusal to recognize Israel as the national home of the Jewish people.

"I intend to put forward legislation on this topic -- Israel as a Jewish and democratic state -- so that there will be no doubts and also no room for people to make claims about the anthem, the Law of Return or the national land, or any of the other elements that make up our national being," Netanyahu added.

The prime minister had similar things to say at an earlier meeting in Jerusalem with the American organization, Friends of the Israel Defense Forces. "Our basic demand is that the Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state," he said. "Recently, [Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas] has said that he is not even willing to discuss recognition of Israel as a Jewish state, and then he went and signed a deal with the terrorist organization Hamas."

Despite concerns over the implications of Abbas joining forces with a known terrorist group, Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon believes the Fatah-Hamas deal will not be implemented. "I do not think Hamas and Fatah will be able to resolve their differences, and therefore they won't even reach the point of an election," Ya'alon said at a Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee meeting.

Ya'alon clarified that even if the deal does go through, Israel would not allow Hamas to participate in elections in Judea and Samaria, as it did in the past.

"There is no partner on the other side," Ya'alon said. "That is the reality."

He continued, "Our soldiers are intelligent enough to understand the complicated reality on the ground and to deal with it."

Shlomo Cesana and Gideon Allon

Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=17359

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