Germany's Continuing Anti-Semitism Problem - Juidith Bergman

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by Juidith Bergman

[D]espite problematic evidence and flawed statistics, Interior Minister Horst Seehofer is still claiming that virtually all anti-Semitism comes from the far-right. Why?

• The German government's new report flies in the face of major EU reports... German statistics on anti-Semitism have been the object of criticism for quite some time.
• "The majority of [anti-Semitism] cases in Berlin are attributed to right-wing extremists -- without evidence..." — Die Welt, May 7, 2019.
• "For a long time, experts have criticized the attribution of the majority of cases to far-right perpetrators... and that too little attention is paid to other groups of perpetrators, such as those from Islamist and other Muslim circles". — Die Welt, May 7, 2019.
• Yet, despite problematic evidence and flawed statistics, Interior Minister Horst Seehofer is still claiming that virtually all anti-Semitism comes from the far-right. Why?
• Despite all these measures, anti-Semitic crime in Germany is the highest it has been in the past two decades. This news alone should raise concerns in Germany that hate-speech laws such as the NetzDG, while severely limiting free speech, are not working. It should also concern other EU countries, such as France, that are looking to Germany as an example to follow.

Anti-Semitism keeps escalating in Germany, and despite problematic evidence and flawed statistics, Interior Minister Horst Seehofer is still claiming that virtually all anti-Semitism comes from the far-right. Pictured: Anti-Israel protesters take part in the annual Al-Quds Day march on June 1, 2019 in Berlin. (Photo by Omer Messinger/Getty Images)

Almost all anti-Semitic crimes in Germany in 2019 were committed by right-wing extremists, according to a recently published government report, "Politically Motivated Crime in 2019." In the report, "politically motivated crimes" are divided into right-wing crimes, left-wing crimes, crimes motivated by foreign ideology, crimes motivated by religious ideology and unassigned crimes.

According to the report, anti-Semitic crimes were 13% higher in 2019 than in 2018, with 2,032 anti-Semitic crimes committed in 2019, the highest number in Germany since 2001. According to the report, 93.4% of those crimes were committed by right-wing extremists.

"The biggest threat is still the threat from the right," Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said following the release of the crime report. "We must remain alert and tackle it. It is an order of magnitude that accompanies us with concern, with great concern."

The German government's new report flies in the face of major EU reports: In November 2018, the EU's Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) published a report, "Antisemitism - Overview of data available in the European Union 2007–2017," which quoted the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) as stating that in 2017:

"The main perpetrators of antisemitic incidents are 'Islamists' and radicalised young Muslims, including schoolchildren, as well as neo-Nazis and sympathisers of extreme-right and, in some cases, extreme-left groups".

Germany was among the countries surveyed.

In another major survey conducted by the FRA and published in December 2018, "Second survey on discrimination and hate crime against Jews in the EU", it was concluded that:

"With respect to the most serious incident of anti-Semitic harassment, on average, across the 12 Member States surveyed, the most frequently mentioned categories for perpetrators were: 'someone else I cannot describe' (31%); 'someone with an extremist Muslim view' (30%); 'someone with a left-wing political view' (21%); 'work or school/college colleague' (16%); 'teenager or group of teenagers' (15%); 'an acquaintance or friend' (15%); 'someone with a right-wing political view' (13%)".

Germany was among the 12 member states surveyed.

In 2017, the Interior Ministry of Germany published a report by the Independent Expert Group on Antisemitism -- a group constituted in September 2009 based on a decision of the German Bundestag -- about antisemitism in Germany. According to the report:

"[In] the survey conducted for the [Independent Expert Group on Antisemitism in] 2016 among Jews in Germany ... 'a Muslim person/group' is mentioned by far the most frequently regarding... verbal insult/harassment, physical attack... followed by 'a person unknown to me'... only then follow in equal numbers left-extremist and far-right persons/groups. For this difference between the classification of the recorded crimes in the PMK... [the annual report about politically motivated crime] and the perception on the part of the persons concerned, there is currently no plausible explanation."

In June 2019, Germany's domestic intelligence service, Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz (BfV), published a report on "Anti-Semitism in Islamism," the purpose of which was "to raise public awareness of Islamist anti-Semitism". The report states:

"The record of these events shows that anti-Semitic incidents with an Islamist background are not uncommon in Germany. For the period from January to December 2017 alone, more than 100 incidents were recorded, ranging from anti-Zionist sermons to anti-Semitic graffiti to verbal and physical attacks against individuals. Probably this is just the proverbial 'tip of the iceberg'".

Which surveys should be believed? Did all Islamist anti-Semitism just disappear overnight?
Presumably not. German statistics on anti-Semitism, however, have been the object of criticism for quite some time. Die Welt wrote in May 2019:

"The majority of [antisemitism] cases in Berlin are attributed to right-wing extremists -- without evidence... For a long time, experts have criticized the attribution of the majority of cases to far-right perpetrators... and that too little attention is paid to other groups of perpetrators, such as those from Islamist and other Muslim circles".

According to a May 2019 article in the German Jewish news outlet Jüdische Allgemeine:

"In surveys of Jews in Germany who were victims of anti-Semitic acts, 62 percent of [victims of verbal] insults and 81 percent of [victims of] physical attacks identified Muslims as suspected perpetrators. Nevertheless, 'Sieg Heil' calls at an anti-Semitic Al-Quds demonstration in Berlin in July 2014 were registered as a politically motivated crime with right-wing extremist motives in the police statistics."

The newspaper also quoted Felix Klein, the Federal Government Commissioner for Jewish Life in Germany and the Fight against Anti-Semitism, as saying:

"I hear from the Jewish communities that the subjective perception of the threat posed by Muslim anti-Semitism is greater than is reflected in the crime statistics."

The Independent Expert Group on Antisemitism, mentioned above, also criticized Germany's statistics in its 2017 report, "Anti-Semitism in Germany - current developments":

"In the police, the old concept of extremism continues to act as a guiding factor, which makes it more difficult to identify prejudice-motivated crimes that go beyond 'the classic pattern of far-right crime'. In particular, this concerns the attribution as 'right'-[wing] as soon as references to National Socialism can be seen. This does not take into account that while Nazi symbols are a general, anti-Jewish means, they are also generally defamatory... [and] used by perpetrators who are not far right-wing politically. Xenophobic and anti-Semitic crimes are basically always attributed to the... right when no further specifics are recognizable (e.g. only the words 'Jews out') and where no suspects are known. This may create... a distorted picture of the motivation behind the crime and the group of perpetrators."

Yet, despite problematic evidence and flawed statistics, Interior Minister Horst Seehofer is still claiming that virtually all anti-Semitism comes from the far-right. Why?

The rise in anti-Semitism to the highest level in nearly two decades also raises a different issue: Germany has some of the strictest hate speech laws in Europe. In October 2017, Germany adopted a new censorship law, the NetzDG law. It is a draconian measure that requires social media platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, to censor their users on behalf of the German state. Social media companies are obliged to delete or block any online "criminal offenses" such as libel, slander, defamation or incitement, within 24 hours of receipt of a user complaint. Social media companies are permitted seven days for more complicated cases. If they fail to do so, the German government can fine them up to 50 million euros for failing to comply. The law served as inspiration for France's recently passed Avia Law.

In addition, German law enforcement agencies have completed no fewer than five "Action Day against Hate Postings" specifically to crack down on internet "hate speech".

Despite all these measures, anti-Semitic crime in Germany is the highest it has been in the past two decades. This news alone should raise concerns in Germany that hate-speech laws such as the NetzDG, while severely limiting free speech, are not working. It should also concern other EU countries, such as France, that are looking to Germany as an example to follow.

That, however, is not happening. In January, Germany announced new crackdowns on free speech, ostensibly to fight antisemitism, as previously reported by Gatestone. In March, the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance -- the human rights monitoring body of the Council of Europe -- published a report that found that Germany, despite its repressive laws, was still not doing enough about hate speech and that:

"... action is required in several areas to effectively prevent and combat hate speech. These encompass awareness-raising, prevention and counter speech, support to victims, self-regulation, the use of regulatory powers and, as a last resort, criminal investigation and punishment".

Germany seems unable to change course. In the meantime, anti-Semitism keeps escalating.

Juidith Bergman, a columnist, lawyer and political analyst, is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Gatestone Institute.

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16098/germany-antisemitism

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Incitement? Hatred? Look no further than Israeli campuses - Eitan Fischberger

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by Eitan Fischberger

Incidents directed at Jewish university groups & individuals are not led exclusively by students, but by academics as well. Opinion

(JNS)

Here in our snug little corner of the Middle East, we often cry foul about the plethora of anti-Israel injustices occurring at universities worldwide, and for good reason. These wrongdoings have been steadily rising for years, and continue to threaten Jewish and Zionist students. However, a bastion of misinformation and terrorist sympathizers exists right here in our own backyard that doesn’t face nearly the opposition it should: Israeli universities.

Yes, your eyes do not deceive you. The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv University, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and the University of Haifa have all experienced this phenomenon.

For example, in 2019, the student branch of the Hadash political party at Hebrew U held a moment of silence in remembrance of Sami Abu Diak, who was convicted by Israel for the murder of Ilya Krivitz during the Second Intifada. Just last month, the same student branch published a video directed at soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces who study on campus, arguing that they are complicit in supposed crimes against humanity inflicted upon the Palestinians since the nakba (“catastrophe” of the establishment of modern-day Israel) of 1948, and must be confronted. Besides containing demonstrably false accusations in the video (like Israeli snipers being stationed on the university’s workshops, which was ironically debunked by Hadash themselves), the video put student-soldiers on campus in danger of reprisal. And yes, the video was proudly endorsed by the Hadash Party itself.
Up north in Haifa—itself a model of coexistence—students also held a moment of silence for terrorists. In 2012, rather than honoring the memory of three innocent Israeli citizens who had just been killed by rocket fire from Gaza, 30 to 40 students from the University of Haifa instead decided to stand in memory of Ahmed Jabari, the former commander of the military wing of Hamas who had been killed the day beforehand.

Back down towards the sandy beaches of Tel Aviv, students at TAU have openly supported terrorists. In April, the student branch of the Balad Party commemorated “Palestinian Prisoners Day” by voicing solidarity with Israa Jaabis, who was imprisoned after she tried to murder Israeli policemen with a car bomb in 2015. According to the Israeli newspaper Makor Rishon, the same group helped bring a production of the play “Return to Haifa” to their campus, based on a novel of the same name by notorious PFLP leader Ghassan Kanafani. On another occasion, students interrupted a talk on campus by an Egyptian lecturer, labeling him a “traitor,” “wicked” and a “collaborator for normalization,” ostensibly for lecturing at an Israeli university, even though they themselves are studying at the same institution (the irony is not lost).

Another group active on Israeli and Western college campuses, Breaking the Silence, peddles unsubstantiated and unverifiable allegations by disgruntled IDF soldiers that portray Israel as an aggressor committing war crimes. Its members have openly associated with BDS activists, and their work has been cited by anti-Semites as proof of Israel’s supposed “terrorist, apartheid regime ruthlessly cruelly, murderously killing innocent civilians,” according to NGO Monitor. In 2016, Ben-Gurion University’s Middle East Studies Department awarded the group the Berelson Prize for Jewish-Arab Understanding, though thankfully the university’s president overturned the decision.

Rest assured that these problematic incidents are not led exclusively by students, but by academics as well.

According to the Communist Party of Israel’s website, in 2018, hundreds of Israeli lecturers in higher education created a petition condemning what it describes as Israel’s “oppressive,” “racist” and “fascistic” regime beyond the Green Line. In 2019, 43 Israeli professors signed onto an open letter that implored the French National Assembly to torpedo a resolution designating anti-Zionism as anti-Semitism. Additionally, the group Boycott from Within, which was partly co-founded by the Weizmann Institute’s Kobi Snitz and Professor Ofer Neiman of BGU, helped pressure The Pixies all-women rock band into canceling their 2010 concert in Israel and took credit for French pop star Vanessa Paradis’s 2011 cancellation.

Even the syllabi on Israeli campuses are problematic. Reporting in 2010 for the Financial Times, Tobias Buck explained that a study conducted by the Institute for Zionist Strategies found that the vast majority of sociology departments in Israel hold “severe anti-Zionist biases.” The study identified 146 references to Zionist sources in the syllabi and 440 references to anti-Zionist sources.

So yes, while the pro-Israel community is correct to focus primarily on institutions outside of Israel, by no means should Israeli campuses be ignored. This is especially true when we remember that every year, Israel is home to thousands of international students (12,000 in 2019) that can be negatively influenced by propaganda and misinformation.

If the aforementioned incidents occurred on American or European campuses, we would rightfully be up in arms. We must therefore react similarly when they occur in Israel. We must facilitate a robust, fact-oriented campus environment, push back against biased professors and hostile student groups supporting terrorists, and most importantly, advocate for the truth on Israeli campuses.

Eitan Fischberger is the Israel coordinator for CAMERA on Campus and a former intern for the Israeli Mission to the United Nations in New York. His articles have been published by “The Jerusalem Post,” “The Daily Wire” and the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs

Source: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/282961

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Why the Left is Afraid of Objectivity - Daniel Greenfield

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by Daniel Greenfield

The great struggle between truth and lies.

The American Left has never been this in love with science and the class of experts who claim to dispense it. Any of its obsessions gains a glow of legitimacy when it attaches, “according to science” somewhere in the sentence, usually preceded by “do this” or “if you aren’t.”

And yet there’s a great deal of interest in science in China, but it’s on the way out in America.

STEM is on the social justice chopping block, under siege on and off campus with demands for equity and diversity, that also translate into less science and more social justice. Science is denounced by social justice squads as the work of dead white men and the new leftist ideology rejects the idea that the sum of 2 and 2 consistently add up to anything except systemic racism.

Seattle public schools contend that western math is “used to disenfranchise​ people and communities of color.” A University of Illinois education professor insisted that, "mathematics itself operates as Whiteness."

"Our research papers turn into media releases, books and legislation that reinforce anti-Black narratives. In STEM, we create technologies that affect every part of our society and are routinely weaponized against Black people," Shut Down STEM insisted. “The evidence of systemic racism in science permeates this nation,” Science, the journal, claimed.

The inherent problem with science is that it requires objectivity. And objectivity is the thing that leftists hate for the same reason that any cult does. Objectivity asserts that we can find the truth by stepping back from our beliefs and emotions in any field from journalism to particle physics.

The Left insists that we don’t transcend our biases through objectivity, but subjectivity.

The politically correct way to discover the truth is by understanding your white privilege and deconstructing the history of human civilization, not by searching for evidence or proof.

Truth comes not from objective facts, but from the subjective “lived experiences” of oppressed minorities whose suffering acts as the revelation of truth. This isn’t truth in the scientific sense, but in the religious sense, with minorities as martyrs revealing our sins to us with their suffering.

To be objective, lefties insist is just to deny your prejudices and evade the important work of checking your white privilege in response to the revelation of minority suffering in America.

But if objectivity is impossible, and scientific objectivity is just whiteness and colonialism, then the only legitimate science is one that asserts that leftist beliefs and values are absolutely true. The Soviet Union attempted to police science, upholding Lysenkoism because it offered a vision of science as the Communist hierarchy wanted it to be, rather than as it was, while suppressing Cybernetics because it offered a vision of reality that the Party elite found threatening.

Communist bosses liked the idea of an easily malleable agricultural system, but disliked the notion of robots replacing workers. The actual science was secondary to the ideological biases of ignorant ideologues who were convinced that they already had access to a higher truth.

Sound familiar?

The Cold War pitted Western scientific objectivity against Eastern ideological subjectivity. And objectivity won. It won to such a degree that scientists in Moscow or Shanghai don’t bother consulting ideological texts like Stalin’s articles or Mao’s sayings before doing research.

But, objectivity is dying off in the West.

Accusations of “whiteness” are to American academia what denunciations of reactionary, cosmopolitan, or idealism were to Soviet scientists. These signals serve the same function, warning scientists that they’re treading on ideologically dangerous territory by pursuing the truth.

So why does the Left claim to love science when it hates it and is threatened by it?

Marxism started out as a bastardized impersonation of a pseudo-science. Time and countless revisions hasn’t improved it any. The Left loves the idea of science, as long as it reflects its agendas, and remains subservient to its crackpot ideas. Just leave the objectivity out of it.

The same war rages in journalism.

“American view-from-nowhere, ‘objectivity’-obsessed, both-sides journalism is a failed experiment. We need to fundamentally reset the norms of our field. The old way must go. We need to rebuild our industry as one that operates from a place of moral clarity,” Wesley Lowery of the New York Times ranted.

Moral clarity is what the Communist apparatchiks also wanted. Their morality and their clarity.

Contrasting moral clarity and objectivity asserts that we can either be moral or search for the truth, but we cannot do both. Moral clarity demands unquestioning allegiance to a belief system. And that belief system must permeate whatever work we do, otherwise our work is immoral.

This quintessentially Communist idea was once relegated in America to certain cultural and academic bywaters, but is now becoming the central requirement for operating in public life.

It’s why corporations have rushed out absurd statements endorsing Black Lives Matter.

Morality, in leftist ideology, comes from politicising everything because the central struggle of humanity, which used to be class, and is currently race, and might, tomorrow, be sexuality, pervades everything in a pseudo-religious struggle for the redemption of mankind.

To be apolitical or objective is to deny the revelation that we must all join the struggle.

What is at stake is more than abstract ideas. The legacy of the Enlightenment divided individual morality from objective truth. Morality became personal and communal, instead of collective, and those beliefs became all the more precious when confronting a universe that did not always reflect them. The reaction to that universe destroyed the faith of some and upheld the faith of others. And some of those who lost their faith used false reason to manufacture another one.

That is where the Left came from. Its ideas sought to fuse together a collective morality and reality by insisting that it had discovered the principles that would make the world into utopia.

The seduction of the pseudo-scientific and pseudo-religious cult of the Left is that it offers  theocracy without god. Its followers believe that they are battling for a moral order that is absolutely true, and that submitting to that moral order will resolve the conflicts of theodicy, restoring a moral universe that accords with our moral views. This is the tragic lie of the Left.

The utopian kingdom of heaven never arrives. The worse things get, the more society has to be purged of its evil ways to atone for its social sins. Pre-revolutionary era ideology reduced social failures to a single root cause, but even once the revolution arrives and the root cause of class warfare or racism is done away with, the system begins hunting for someone else to blame.

That is what we are living through now.

In its pseudo-religious and pseudo-scientific folly, the Left believes that suffering, that of its martyrs of class or race, or of the designated oppressors, represents truth. It attacks science by insisting that the suffering of the working class or of trans people of color represents a truth beyond the flawed reasoning of the human mind to which everyone is obligated to kneel.

Truth, it tells us, comes from empathy and guilt, not from stepping away from our emotions.

How we feel about something can represent a moral truth. But what we do about it requires objective reasoning. The Left’s rejection of that reality is why it always ends up failing.

The Left exploits other people’s misery for power and ego. It doesn’t want answers. It wants to transmute idealism into hate, fear, and guilt. That’s why it hates truth. Its bastardization of religion and science is a lie and its prophets and experts never explain their failures.

Objectivity enables a moral society to solve its problems. The Left is at war with objectivity because it doesn’t want those problems solved. Objectivity would take away its power.


Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is an investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical Left and Islamic terrorism.

Source: https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/07/why-left-afraid-objectivity-daniel-greenfield/

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Exposing the Lies of Black Lives Matter - John Perazzo

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by John Perazzo

Where black racism and Marxism are dressed up as “social justice.”

Black Lives Matter (BLM) was established in 2013 by a trio of self-identified Marxist revolutionaries. Striving to make white Americans “uncomfortable about institutional racism” and the “structural oppression” that allegedly “prevents so many [black people] from realizing their dreams,” BLM contends that blacks living under America's “white supremacist system” are routinely targeted for “extrajudicial killings … by police and vigilantes.” That claim has become an article of faith for the millions of American leftists who dutifully parrot BLM's talking points. The remainder of this article is dedicated to providing hard data which exposes BLM's worldview as nothing more than a mountain of malicious lies.
Debunking BLM's Claims About Police Use of Force
A major Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) report in 2001 examined incidents where police in the United States used deadly force to kill criminal suspects between 1976 and 1998. During that 23-year span, 42% of all suspects killed by police were black – a figure that comported precisely with the percentage of violent crimes committed by African Americans during that same period. This is enormously significant because we would expect that in police forces not plagued by systemic racism, officers would shoot suspects of various racial or ethnic backgrounds at rates closely resembling their respective involvement in the types of serious crimes most likely to elicit the use of force by police. And indeed, that is exactly what the evidence shows.
The same BJS report found that in nearly two-thirds of all justifiable homicides by police during 1976-98, the officer’s race and the suspect’s race were the same. When a white or Hispanic officer killed a suspect, that suspect was usually (63% of the time) white or Hispanic as well. And when a black officer killed a suspect, that suspect was usually black (81% of the time).
The BJS report also examined the rate at which officers killed suspects of other racial or ethnic backgrounds. In 1998, the “black-officer-kills-black-felon” rate was 32 per 100,000 black officers, more than double the rate at which white and Hispanic officers killed black felons (14 per 100,000). That same year, the rate at which white and Hispanic officers killed white or Hispanic felons (28 per 100,000) was much higher than the “black-officer-kills-white-or-Hispanic-felon” rate of 11 per 100,000.
In 1999, criminologists Geoffrey Alpert and Roger Dunham confirmed once again that police officers were more likely to use force against suspects of their own racial group, than against suspects from another racial group.
A 2011 BJS study which covered the period from 2003 to 2009 sheds further light on the issue of police use of force against people of various racial and ethnic backgrounds. Of all suspects who are known to have been killed by police during that 7-year time frame, 41.7% were white, 31.7% were black, and 20.3% were Hispanic. It is also worth noting that during the 2003-2009 period—when blacks were 31.7% of all suspects killed by an officer—blacks accounted for about 38.5% of all arrests for violent crimes, which are the types of crimes most likely to trigger potentially deadly confrontations with police. These numbers do not in any way suggest a lack of restraint by police in their dealings with black suspects. On the contrary, they strongly suggest exactly the opposite.[1]
In 2015, a Justice Department study of the Philadelphia Police Department found that black officers were 67 percent more likely than their white colleagues to mistakenly shoot an unarmed black suspect, and Hispanic officers were 145 percent more likely to do the same. That same year, a study of the New York Police Department by criminology professor Greg Ridgeway found that black officers were 3.3 times more likely than their white peers to discharge their guns in the course of their work. So much for the notion of trigger-happy white cops.
In any given year, a mere 0.6 percent of black men report that physical force of any kind – including mild actions like pushing and grabbing – is used against them by the police. The corresponding figure for white men is approximately 0.2 percent. Though both figures are infinitesimally small, critics of the police are quick to complain that the figure for blacks is three times higher than the figure for whites. But as National Review points out, that disparity is fully accounted for by the fact that “black men commit violent crimes at much higher rates than white men,” as evidenced by data from the annual National Crime Victimization Survey.
The available data indicate that a mere 0.08 percent of black men and white men alike are injured by police in any given year. This figure includes injuries sustained as a result of police actions that are legally justified, and often necessary, in order to thwart criminal behavior.
In a 2018 working paper titled “An Empirical Analysis of Racial Differences in Police Use of Force,” Harvard economist Roland Fryer, who is African American, reported that police officers in Houston were nearly 24 percent less likely to shoot black suspects than white suspects. In a separate analysis of officer shootings in three Texas cities, six Florida counties, and the city of Los Angeles, Fryer found that: (a) officers were 47 percent less likely to discharge their weapon without first being attacked if the suspect was black, than if the suspect was white; (b) black and white individuals shot by police were equally likely to have been armed at the time of the shootings; (c) white officers were no more likely to shoot unarmed blacks than unarmed whites; (d) black officers were more likely to shoot unarmed whites than unarmed blacks; and (e) black officers were more likely than white officers to shoot unarmed whites. There is no evidence of anti-black racism in any of these findings, though some of them do seem to suggest an anti-white bias.
A 2019 study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences shows that white officers are no more likely than black or Hispanic officers to shoot black civilians. “In fact,” writes Manhattan Institute scholar Heather Mac Donald, the study found that “if there is a bias in police shootings after crime rates are taken into account, it is against white civilians.” Specifically, Mac Donald adds, the authors of the study compiled a database of 917 officer-involved fatal shootings in 2015 and found that 55 percent of the victims were white, 27 percent were black, and 19 percent were Hispanic.
Each and every year, without exception, whites who are shot and killed by police officers in the U.S. far outnumber blacks and Hispanics who meet that same fate. In 2017, for instance, 457 whites, 223 blacks, and 179 Hispanics were killed by police officers in the line of duty. In 2018, the corresponding figures were 399 whites, 209 blacks, and 148 Hispanics. And in 2019, the totals were 370 whites, 235 blacks, and 158 Hispanics. There is not a hint of anti-black racism anywhere in these figures.
When we compare black rates of violent crime, with the rate at which blacks are shot and killed by police officers, we find that blacks are represented among those shooting victims at rates significantly lower than we would have expected in light of their crime rates. For example, in 2017, blacks were just 23.6% of all people shot dead by police, even though they were arrested for 37.5% of all violent crimes. The following year, blacks were 26.3% of those fatally shot by police, even as they were arrested for fully 37.4% of violent crimes.
According to Heather Mac Donald: “The per capita rate of officers being feloniously killed is 45 times higher than the rate at which unarmed black males are killed by cops. And an officer’s chance of getting killed by a black assailant is 18.5 times higher than the chance of an unarmed black getting killed by a cop.”
Debunking BLM's Claims About Interracial Crime Against Blacks
In 2012 and 2013, blacks in the U.S. committed an annual average of 560,600 violent crimes (excluding homicide) against whites, while whites committed a yearly average of 99,403 violent crimes against blacks. In other words, blacks were the attackers in about 85 percent of all violent crimes involving blacks and whites, while whites were the attackers in 15 percent.[2]
When white offenders committed crimes of violence (excluding homicide) against either whites or blacks in 2012-13, they targeted white victims 95.8 percent of the time, and they went after black victims a mere 4.1 percent of the time. By contrast, when black offenders committed crimes of violence against either whites or blacks in 2012-13, they targeted white victims a whopping 48.5 percent of the time, and they went after black victims 51.4 percent of the time.[3] If we factor into the equation the relative sizes of America's white and black populations, we find that, statistically, any given black person in 2012-13 was about 27 times more likely to attack a white, than vice versa.
In more recent years, the disproportionate prevalence of black-on-white crime has only gotten worse. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, in 2018 there were 593,598 interracial violent victimizations (excluding homicide) between blacks and whites in the United States. Blacks committed 537,204 of those interracial felonies, or 90.4 percent, while whites committed 56,394 of them, or about 9.5 percent.
When white offenders committed crimes of violence against either whites or blacks in 2018, they targeted white victims 97.3 percent of the time, and they went after black victims 2.6 percent of the time. By contrast, when black offenders committed crimes of violence against either whites or blacks during that same year, they targeted white victims 58 percent of the time, and they went after black victims 42 percent of the time.[4]
City Journal reports that according to Justice Department data, blacks in 2018 were overrepresented among the perpetrators of offenses classified as “hate crimes” by a whopping 50 percent—while whites were underrepresented by 24 percent.
The facts presented above can lead us to only one possible conclusion: BLM's claim that African Americans are routinely targeted for “extrajudicial killings … by police and vigilantes” is a monstrous lie. The purpose of the lie is to cause Americans of all races to detest their own country, so as to promote a desire to raze the nation's traditions to the ground, and to then erect a new Marxist utopia upon its ruins.

NOTES
[1] The annual violent-crime arrest statistics for 2003-2009, broken down by race, can be found here: 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, and 2009.
[2] Bureau of Justice Statistics, National Crime Victimization Survey, 2012-13, Special Tabulation, Table 10.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Bureau of Justice Statistics, Criminal Victimization, 2018, Table 14.

John Perazzo

Source: https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/07/exposing-lies-black-lives-matter-john-perazzo/

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'Uncle Tom,' the Movie - Larry Elder

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by Larry Elder

"Why is there no respectful disagreement in the black community?"

On June 19, also known as Juneteenth, the celebration of the end of slavery in the United States, we released our film, "Uncle Tom." It follows a young, black, Christian contractor, Chad Jackson, who was a long-time Democrat until challenged by a fellow Christian to read the platforms of the Democratic and Republican parties.

He did.

Jackson was shocked to discover that his support for limited government, low taxes and school choice, and his opposition to abortion on demand, made him a ... Republican!

"Uncle Tom" explores the often-vicious blowback Jackson got from friends and family, let alone others, when he announced his conversion. Instead of Jackson's evolution sparking a healthy discussion about which party's policies better advance the interests of Blacks, Jackson found himself being called "Uncle Tom," a "sellout" and a "self-loather."

The film simply asks: "Why is there no respectful disagreement in the black community? Why are great black thinkers like Thomas Sowell, Walter Williams and Shelby Steele ignored or marginalized by the black and mainstream media?" Despite impressive, decades-long bodies of work — columns, books and speeches — Sowell, Williams and Steele are completely unknown to many Blacks, and not just young Blacks.

Black conservatives do not attribute every major problem in the Black community to slavery and Jim Crow. Black conservatives do not believe that racism remains a significant problem in American society. Black conservatives believe the welfare state has incentivized women to marry the government and has incentivized men to abandon their financial and moral responsibility, a far bigger problem in America than racism.

"Uncle Tom" asks, why can't these points of view be debated? Are Black conservatives any less interested in the advancement of the Black community than Black liberals? If not, why the vitriol? Why the derision?

The early reviews of "Uncle Tom" exceeded our wildest expectations. As of this writing, the movie site IMDb shows that over 350 viewers rated the film, giving it an overall rating of 9.7 out of 10. One hundred and thirteen posted written reviews, with all but one giving it 10 stars out of 10. (The one exception gave it a 9.)

Here are some:
"This may be the best documentary I've ever seen — I am a professional filmmaker. This is one of, if not the most important film of the 21st century. I do not say that lightly. Everyone has to see this. It's truly life changing. It's a film full of heart, victory, unity, truth, and true patriotism — You'll never be so proud to be an American. Don't pass on it."

"This movie is like an alarm clock — Some people might not like what they are hearing when they watch it but that doesn't change the fact that it is time to wake up. I applaud the courage, the genius, and the love and compassion that went into the making of this important film."

"Thank you for giving us the opportunity to watch a wonderful film that rejects the victim narrative that the Democrats try and push on the black community. This film is so powerful and deserves so much positive recognition. I had high expectations for this film, and it EXCEEDED my expectations!!"

"A clean, wonderfully informative production. I was aware of some of the notions put forward in this film but by no means whatsoever was I ready to be immersed with just so much factually unequivocal depth! Truly eye-opening and fantastic to see such a diverse array of characters, each with their own insights and anecdotes. A straightforward and rather in-your-face approach to demolishing the left's insistence on minority control. Superb production, cast and motive. Regardless of your political leaning, this no holds barred piece definitely gets the mind racing and questioning all that we are inundated with in the media."

"This honestly made me cry. I cannot believe I didnt know this!!! The denigration of the black family by liberal supremacy makes me sick. Arent these the same people who control all of Hollywood, 95% of the media, and big tech. They have used violence and trickery to gain their power ... my heart is aching!"

"A MASSIVE EYE OPENER! I'm a documentary junkie and this is one of the greatest I've seen. Extremely well put together, talking to some truly inspirational, intelligent, and motivated individuals who in my opinion holds the key to elevate Americans to the next level, regardless of race. Will be watching again."

To see "Uncle Tom," just go to UncleTom.com. Let me know what you think.

Larry Elder

Source: https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/07/uncle-tom-movie-larry-elder/

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'Incident' damages construction near Iranian nuclear site - News Agencies and ILH Staff

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by News Agencies and ILH Staff

An "incident" damaged an under-construction building near the Natanz nuclear site, but no damage was caused to its centrifuge facility, Iranian spokesman says.

The Natanz nuclear site in Iran | Photo: Reuters

Centrifuge machines in the Natanz uranium enrichment facility in central Iran 

(Atomic Energy Organization of Iran via AP)

An "incident" damaged an under-construction building Thursday near Iran's underground Natanz nuclear enrichment facility, though it did not affect its centrifuge operations or cause any release of radiation, an Iranian spokesman said.

The affected building, described as an "industrial shed," was above ground and not part of the enrichment facility itself, said Behrouz Kamalvandi, a spokesman for the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran. The state-run Islamic Republic News Agency quoted Kamalvandi as saying there was "no need for concern" over the incident.

"There is no concern about the possibility of contamination as one of the sheds, which was inactive and under construction, was damaged and not the facility itself," Kamalvandi told IRNA.

However, there was no previously announced construction work at Natanz, a uranium enrichment center some 250 kilometers (155 miles) south of the capital, Tehran. Natanz includes underground facilities buried under some 7.6 meters (25 feet) of concrete, which offers protection from airstrikes.
Natanz is among the sites now monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency after Iran's 2015 nuclear deal with world powers. The IAEA did not immediately respond to a request for comment over the incident.

Last week, a large explosion from an area in the mountains east of Tehran, which analysts believe hides an underground tunnel system and missile production sites, shook the Iranian capital.

Natanz, in Iran's central Isfahan province, hosts the country's main uranium enrichment facility. There, centrifuges rapidly spin uranium hexafluoride gas to enrich uranium. Currently, the IAEA says Iran enriches uranium to about 4.5% purity, above the terms of the nuclear deal, but far below weapons-grade levels of 90%.

The US under President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew from the nuclear deal in May 2018, setting up months of tensions between Tehran and Washington. Iran now is breaking all the production limits set by the deal, but still allows IAEA inspectors and cameras to watch its nuclear sites.

However, Natanz did become a point of controversy last year as Iranian officials refused to allow an IAEA inspector into the facility in October after allegedly testing positive for suspected traces of explosive nitrates. Nitrates are a common fertilizer. However, when mixed with proper amounts of fuel, the material can become an explosive as powerful as TNT. Swab tests, common at airports and other secure facilities, can detect its presence on the skin or objects.

News Agencies and ILH Staff

Source: https://www.israelhayom.com/2020/07/02/incident-damages-construction-near-iran-nuclear-site/

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National security law: facing disqualification, or worse, Hong Kong opposition groups head into uncertain election season - Natalie Wong

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by Natalie Wong

Hopes for Legco triumph in September cloud over as new law introduces major potential hurdles for candidates from localist and pan-democrat camps

Veteran opposition politician Lee Cheuk-yan is surrounded by riot police during an illegal demonstration against Hong Kong’s new national security law on July 1. Photo: Sam Tsang

Hong Kong’s localist and pan-democrat politicians face an uncertain future ahead of September’s Legislative Council elections, as the newly passed national security law has effectively empowered authorities to disqualify candidates and halt their overseas activities.

Analysts warned that even if mainland authorities choose not to wield their sweeping power against candidates who fail to demonstrate loyalty to the regime, the law’s ambiguity could create a chilling effect on their campaigns all the same.

I cannot simply say what acts or speeches will disqualify a person. The most important thing is to act according to the law Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam

Tuesday’s passage of the law, which criminalises secession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces, and includes penalties of up to life in prison, was accompanied by near-immediate changes to the city’s vibrant political landscape.

Localists, an emerging force in Hong Kong politics in recent years, suffered the first blow, as activist group Demosisto and seven other groups that had advocated for self-determination or independence disbanded local operations or shifted overseas before the law even took effect.

Hong Kong national security law full text

But that public step back cannot fully allay their concerns, as the stiffer-than-expected law covers not only activities in Hong Kong but actions outside the territory, including those taken by non-permanent residents, according to Article 38.

It was also unclear if their connections with foreign groups would put them afoul of Article 29, which states that anyone who “receives instructions, control, funding or other kinds of support from a foreign country or an institution” to commit collusion would be in violation of the law.

‘Sad day for Hong Kong’: reaction as Beijing reveals security law details

1 Jul 2020

Activists Nathan Law Kwun-chung and Joshua Wong Chi-fung, who earlier vowed to run for September’s elections under the Demosisto umbrella, said their recent withdrawal from the group would not deter them from running as independent candidates.

Law said he believed Beijing had deliberately made the scope of offences “extremely broad” to threaten pro-democracy politicians, but that he would not step back from the “international battle line”.

Nathan Law (centre), seen with fellow activists Agnes Chow and Joshua Wong, testified via video conference for the US Congress’ House Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday, an act that could put him afoul of the new national security law. Photo: K.Y. Cheng

Law and exiled activist Brian Leung Kai-ping testified via video conference before the United States Congress’ House Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday night about the new security law’s implications, the first local political activists to address a high-profile foreign audience since the legislation took effect.

“Participating in the hearing at such a critical time carries certain risks. No matter how my acts comply with international standards and diplomatic logic, I’m not sure if my testimony will be considered as ‘evidence’ of national security law offences,” Law said on his Facebook page before attending the meeting.

While the opposition camp has never held a majority at Hong Kong’s Legislative Council, last year’s anti-government protests propelled them to a landslide victory in November’s district council elections, seeding hope they could do the same at Legco.

With less than three months before September’s polls, the picture of who will run is slowly coming into focus, with primaries in mid July to decide pro-democracy candidates for 35 races across the city’s five directly elected geographic constituencies.

With the nomination period approaching in the later half of this month, Civic Party lawmaker Tanya Chan said the opposition camp faced uncertainty given clauses in the new law that could strip candidates of their right to run for office.

According to Article 35, any resident convicted of security national offences will be banned from running in local elections, while lawmakers, government officials and public office holders will be immediately evicted from their posts if found guilty.

“Does it mean stripping political rights permanently? I dare not say,” Chan said.

Her ally Dennis Kwok, a lawmaker from the legal sector, earlier said he “expected to be ousted” from the legislature, after repeated attacks by Beijing officials who claimed he had violated his oath by stalling the election of the House Committee chairperson.

Hong Kong courts have fine line to walk adjudicating cases involving new legislation, legal experts say 2 Jul 2020

When asked if someone found guilty of a national security law offence would be disqualified from public office for life, Secretary for Justice Teresa Cheng Yeuk-wah failed to give a definitive answer, but hinted it was possible, as the law states no time frame for the penalty.

The city leader, Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor, also said that whether a candidate is disqualified from office for objecting to the new security law would be “determined case by case”, as the power to disqualify lies with the electoral officers.

“I cannot simply say what acts or speeches will disqualify a person. The most important thing is to act according to the law,” she said on Wednesday.

Pan-democratic lawmakers hold a press conference to condemn the new national security law for Hong Kong on July 1. Photo: May Tse

In 2016, six opposition lawmakers were disqualified from taking their seats after the High Court ruled they had taken their oaths improperly.

But even if allowed to run, the law’s ambiguity could influence would-be lawmakers’ campaign messages, according to Dixon Ming Sing, a political-science professor at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

“They will have to act and speak very cautiously in public, especially concerning their stances about the national security law and other government policies, as the offences were defined very sweepingly,” he said.

National security law: peaceful protesters could land in jail, legal experts warn

2 Jul 2020

“Provoking hatred by unlawful means” towards the Hong Kong or central governments could constitute collusion under Article 29, he noted, while “seriously interfering in, disrupting, or undermining” government activities could be subversion under Article 22.

Chinese University political scientist Ivan Choy Chi-keung said the disbandment of political groups advocating for independence and democratic self-determination will deprive some voters, particularly younger ones, of their favoured candidates.

“If [these groups] are suppressed and gone, young people will feel very frustrated,” Choy said, adding it was hard to gauge if the votes would go to others in the opposition.

Additional reporting by Sum Lok-kei and Lilian Cheng

Natalie Wong

Source: https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3091433/national-security-law-facing-disqualification-or-worse-hong

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