Perfidy in Kabul - Huck Davenport

 

by Huck Davenport

Our careless abandonment of Afghanistan to the ravening Taliban speaks to the type of nation we’ve become.

Biden is the perfect leader for his valueless, inhuman party in an unprincipled, morally bankrupt country. Anyone with even a shred of humanity who takes a moment to understand the abject depravity of what we have just unleashed on millions of people in Afghanistan and who isn’t physically sickened and morally enraged doesn’t deserve to live in civil society.

The rapes, murders, torture, and stunning Rape-of-Nanking style horrors being unleashed—entirely unnecessarily—are stunning and shocking. Our complicity is unforgivable. Watching human beings so terrified of the evil we’ve just visited upon them desperately clinging to the outside of our transport planes and falling to certain death is a breathtaking testament to the Taliban monster and our morally debased country.

Biden’s self-serving dishonest reasoning—as if he is capable of any other—that his only choice was to “withdraw our forces or escalating the conflict and sending thousands more American troops back into combat“ is as deceitful as it is obtuse. We had just 2,500 soldiers in Afghanistan providing vital intelligence and air cover and they hadn’t suffered a casualty in over a year. Compare that to 25,000 troops in Korea for the last 70 years, 50,000 in Japan, and 35,000 in Germany.

More than what it did on the ground for the Afghan military, that small troop presence in Afghanistan was a significant and crucial display of American resolve. It was all that was needed to keep Afghanistan from returning to a pre 9-11 style terrorist haven, as well as keeping the worst forces of wretched inhumanity from descending on women and children.

But to this treasonous scoundrel who is our President, none of this matters. What matters to Biden is that he could stand before the American people on the 20th anniversary of 9/11 and announce that it is he alone who ended the war, all hail his wisdom and courage—hence the immovable August 31st deadline, even if it means leaving tens of thousands of Americans behind.

What makes this possible is not simply a loathsome, ignorant, demented President; it is that this President embodies the collective values of this nation if you can even call them values. From America’s inception, Americans have been good, decent, moral people who valued freedom, achievement, knowledge, and family. Our number one export to the world has been liberty and we’ve paid dearly for this export with the blood of courageous young men and the treasure of a willing nation.

That America is unrecognizable today. Americans haven’t the vaguest clue as to what is right or wrong anymore, and neither do their leaders. Women in the men’s room and vice versa, sure; men competing in women’s sports, why not; riot and burn our cities, tear down our statues, job well done; police getting in the way of your violent protests, defund them; if you can’t convict someone with the evidence, no problem, change the evidence; someone tweeting against the party line, damn the First Amendment, censor them, fire them, harass them, make sure they never work again; but if you dare to protect yourself from violent masked thugs with a gun, well, you’re going to prison for a long, long time.

We live in a dishonest, hate-filled country where our laws and Constitution are all but ignored; the stench of corruption seeps from every corner of the giant state bureaucracies; and its moral foundation has been eviscerated by the self-loathing pseudo-intellectuals who’ve taken control.

Behind it all are the philosophical abominations of multiculturalism and diversity that have been so effective at brainwashing American society that we have been beaten into not caring or actually believing it—and I am not sure which is worse.

Multiculturalism undermines our moral judgment. We must accept that other cultures choose to do things differently: female genital mutilation, honor killings, forced marriage, who are we to judge? Its evil twin, diversity, is a direct assault on a society built on meritocracy. Test scores and accomplishments—in fact, the very “content of our character”—are meaningless when measured against race, gender, and sexual orientation. No philosophical combination could better ensure the rise of an immoral kakistocracy that is now the United States of America.

So when our Plagiarist-in-Chief—who never had an original thought in his life—explains that the mass genocide of the Uyghurs is merely because “each country has its own norms,” he speaks with what has now become the embodiment of American values. A morally rudderless President of a morally rudderless country who told reporters, “the Taliban, per se, is not our enemy,“ so who cares?

Elie Wiesel wrote “Night“ to remind people of their obligation to care and warn of tribalism’s abject cruelty that runs just beneath the surface of man when unmoored from morality. Generations have passed since then, and we have forgotten. So let the Taliban survivors remind us:

“They killed everybody, in the streets, in the shops. They got into our house and got my father and brother, and took them out. My mother and sister went to see their bodies: they came back with broken hearts.”

“A Taliban soldier came to the house to marry my 16-year-old sister, but my father refused. Three days later we found my father’s mutilated body in front of the house and they took my sister anyway. I’ve never seen her again.”

“I saw a man who was over 40 take a 10-year-old girl. The girl was screaming. I’ll never forget those screams, screaming ‘mama, mama.’ But we could do nothing.”

“The main attraction at the sports arenas are executions, complete with refreshments for the spectators. A couple was buried alive up to their necks, then they ordered people to throw stones until they were stoned to death. Their crime, a secret love affair.”

“Forced under the burqa, women are forbidden to leave the house without a male relative. They can’t attend work or school, they can’t laugh out loud. If they are wearing nail polish, they’ll have their nails pulled out.”

The American dégringolade that has been underway for decades is now complete. Brazen in his cowardice, Biden’s withdrawal from our founding principles and responsibilities will be remembered as the watershed in the collapse of the American ideal.

Image: In 2012, when two tribal leaders were fighting over the same woman, they executed her for “adultery” to save face. CNN video screen grab.

To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here.

 

Huck Davenport

Source: https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2021/08/perfidy_in_kabul.html

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Iran Mullahs Closer Than Ever to Obtaining Nuclear Weapons - Majid Rafizadeh

 

by Majid Rafizadeh

It seems -- worryingly, especially after failures of both intelligence and planning in the Afghanistan debacle -- that the Biden administration is again standing idly by while the mullahs of Iran comfortably keep enriching uranium to acquire a nuclear weapons arsenal.

• The Biden administration... has made no efforts to pressure the Iranian regime into answering the International Atomic Energy Agency's questions about three undeclared clandestine nuclear sites found in Iran.

• "For objectivity's sake, I should say that the Iranian government has reiterated its will to engage and to cooperate and to provide answers, but they haven't done that so far. So I hope this may change, but as we speak, we haven't had any concrete progress." — General Rafael Mariano Grossi, Director General, International Atomic Energy Agency, Seattle Times, June 7, 2021.

• It seems -- worryingly, especially after failures of both intelligence and planning in the Afghanistan debacle -- that the Biden administration is again standing idly by while the mullahs of Iran comfortably keep enriching uranium to acquire a nuclear weapons arsenal.

• We have seen what they do to their own people and the region when they do not have one. Just look at what has been called "the world's greatest sponsor of state terrorism" has done when they have no nuclear weapons -- both domestically to their own people, and internationally to Lebanon, Yemen, Libya, Iraq, Syria, Saudi Arabia, the Palestinian territories and even Venezuela and larger South America... What then can the Free World expect that Iran will do after they have nuclear weapons?

The Iranian regime appears just a few months away from obtaining nuclear weapons, all while the Biden administration is completely silent and has not articulated any clear policy for preventing this dangerous and predatory regime from becoming a nuclear state like North Korea. Pictured: The heavy water production facility at Arak, south of Tehran. (Photo by Majid Saeedi/Getty Images)

The Iranian regime appears just a few months away from obtaining nuclear weapons, all while the Biden administration is completely silent and has not articulated any clear policy for preventing this dangerous and predatory regime from becoming a nuclear state like North Korea.

Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz told ambassadors from countries on the United Nations Security Council during a briefing at the Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem on August 4, 2021:

"Iran has violated all of the guidelines set in the JCPOA and is only around 10 weeks away from acquiring weapons-grade materials necessary for a nuclear weapon... Now is the time for deeds – words are not enough. It is time for diplomatic, economic and even military deeds, otherwise the attacks will continue."

The Biden administration has been insisting on reviving the disastrous Obama nuclear deal and the theocratic establishment of Iran has evidently seen this as a perfect opportunity to buy time and inch closer to acquiring nuclear weapons.

The Biden administration first showed its desperation by making it clear to the Iranian leaders that the US wanted to return to the nuclear deal and was willing to lift all sanctions re-imposed by the Trump administration.

As nuclear talks began, the Iranian regime began advancing its nuclear program at a faster pace as the negotiations went on. The Biden administration not only remained silent in the face of Iran's violations, it also started offering even more concessions to the mullahs. The Biden administration, for instance, announced not only that it was willing to lift nuclear-related sanctions, but also that it was considering lifting non-nuclear related sanctions.

Iran first began increasing uranium enrichment to 20% in January 2021. On January 9, the Iranian parliament passed a law requiring the government to expel the International Atomic Energy Agency's nuclear inspectors. In April, the regime raised its uranium enrichment level to 60%, edging closer to weapons-grade levels. While his government was holding indirect nuclear talks with the Biden administration, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, speaker of Iran's parliament, bragged:

"The young and God-believing Iranian scientists managed to achieve a 60% enriched uranium product. I congratulate the brave nation of Islamic Iran on this success. The Iranian nation's willpower is miraculous and can defuse any conspiracy."

On July 6, while the Geneva nuclear talks were ongoing, the regime began producing enriched uranium metal. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN nuclear watchdog group, warned:

"Today, Iran informed the Agency that UO2 (uranium oxide) enriched up to 20 percent U-235 would be shipped to the R&D laboratory at the Fuel Fabrication Plant in Esfahan, where it would be converted to UF4 (uranium tetrafluoride) and then to uranium metal enriched to 20 percent U-235, before using it to manufacture the fuel."

A joint statement issued by the UK, France and Germany agreed that the Iranian regime "has no credible civilian need for uranium metal R&D and production, which are a key step in the development of a nuclear weapon."

The Biden administration, in addition, has made no efforts to pressure the Iranian regime into answering the International Atomic Energy Agency's questions about three undeclared clandestine nuclear sites found in Iran. IAEA Director General General Rafael Mariano Grossi stated:

"Iran must decide to cooperate in a clearer manner with the agency to give the necessary clarifications. The fact that we found traces (of uranium) is very important. That means there is the possibility of nuclear activities and material that are not under international supervision and about which we know not the origin or the intent. That worries me."

Grossi also warned:

"The lack of progress in clarifying the agency's questions concerning the correctness and completeness of Iran's safeguards declarations seriously affects the ability of the agency to provide assurance of the peaceful nature of Iran's nuclear program. For objectivity's sake, I should say that the Iranian government has reiterated its will to engage and to cooperate and to provide answers, but they haven't done that so far. So I hope this may change, but as we speak, we haven't had any concrete progress."

It seems -- worryingly, especially after failures of both intelligence and planning in the Afghanistan debacle -- that the Biden administration is again standing idly by while the mullahs of Iran comfortably keep enriching uranium to acquire a nuclear weapons arsenal.

We have seen what the ruling mullahs do to their own people and the region even before they have nuclear weapons. Just take a look at what the country called "the world's greatest sponsor of state terrorism" has already done both domestically to their own people, and internationally to Lebanon, Yemen, Libya, Iraq, Syria, Saudi Arabia, the Palestinian territories and even Venezuela and larger South America -- not to mention a recent deadly attack on a commercial oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman. What then is the Free World expecting the mullahs to do after they have nuclear weapons?

• Follow Majid Rafizadeh on Twitter

 

Dr. Majid Rafizadeh is a business strategist and advisor, Harvard-educated scholar, political scientist, board member of Harvard International Review, and president of the International American Council on the Middle East. He has authored several books on Islam and US foreign policy. He can be reached at Dr.Rafizadeh@Post.Harvard.Edu

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17653/iran-obtaining-nuclear-weapons

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History Lesson - Biden is Obama 3.0 on Embracing Jihadists - Pete Hoekstra

 

by Pete Hoekstra

The Biden administration must... Refuse with absolute consistency to work with radical Islamist groups. Exceptions to this rule must be limited to cases of absolute and immediate necessity. Never trust and always verify, verify, and verify.

• Biden is following in Obama's ill-fated footsteps. In fact, Biden's foreign policy is so unoriginal that you could almost describe the "Biden Doctrine" -- as more and more left-wing pundits are calling it -- as "Obama on steroids."

• The Biden administration must... Refuse with absolute consistency to work with radical Islamist groups. Exceptions to this rule must be limited to cases of absolute and immediate necessity. Never trust and always verify, verify, and verify.

• Send powerful messages of support to Taiwan, Ukraine, Israel and our allies in Asia such as Japan and Australia especially. These are the partners most at risk because of Biden's failure in Afghanistan, and his inadequate responses to China and Russia, our other greatest adversaries.

• Make it clear, now that the U.S. is at a much greater risk than just a few weeks ago, that any attack against the U.S. will be met with the harshest response.

President Joe Biden is following in Barack Obama's ill-fated footsteps. In fact, Biden's foreign policy is so unoriginal that you could almost describe the "Biden Doctrine" -- as more and more left-wing pundits are calling it -- as "Obama on steroids." (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

"Rommel, you magnificent bastard, I read your book!" An unforgettable line from the classic movie Patton. George C. Scott, in the title role as the legendary General George Patton, is surveying the battlefield from his command post. He senses that his U.S. forces will rout the Germans, led by the brilliant Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, in this pivotal World War II tank battle in Tunisia. Why would the Americans be blessed with victory? In large part because Patton, himself a military genius, took the time to thoroughly study Rommel's book on battlefield tactics and strategy during the previous war, World War I. Patton believed in the value of knowing his history, learning from his adversaries and avoiding the mistakes of his predecessors.

I truly wish President Joe Biden were interested in learning from history. Tragically, however, the pattern is becoming more pronounced every day: instead of learning from the mistakes of the Obama administration, many of them, by the way, his own mistakes as Obama's vice president, Biden is following in Obama's ill-fated footsteps. In fact, Biden's foreign policy is so unoriginal that you could almost describe the "Biden Doctrine" -- as more and more left-wing pundits are calling it -- as "Obama on steroids."

As the disaster in Afghanistan sadly illustrates, it is especially Biden's "doctrine" in the Middle East that is nothing other than Obama on steroids, more like a super-charged Obama 3.0 than even Obama 2.0.

Upon taking office approximately seven years after 9/11, Obama wanted to forget the lessons of that terrible September day. He fundamentally changed America's perspective on the challenges and threats to our national security, especially in the Middle East and North Africa region. He embraced many groups and individuals that the U.S. had previously shunned because of their links to radical jihadist movements and theology.

In June 2009, during his first visit to the Middle East, Obama gave a major speech in Cairo. Many may not remember what he said, but they will never forget the symbolism of having leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) in the audience sitting in prominent positions. Many governments in the region consider the MB to be a terrorist organization. At the very least, the MB has a history of engaging in violent activities. It is decidedly anti-Western and anti-American. Many MB members are known terrorist leaders, and radical Islamist ideology is widespread in the MB.

Less than two years later, the Obama administration supported the Arab Spring as it rocked the Middle East. As part of its naïve -- and ahistorical -- utopianism, the Obama administration tolerated the overthrow of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, because he was an autocrat. Mubarak was certainly far from an ideal ruler, but he was an ally of the U.S. and a powerful force against radical Islamism and jihadist terrorism. In a region full of sworn enemies of Israel and the United States, Mubarak maintained full diplomatic relations with Israel.

When Mubarak fell, Egypt came under the control of the Muslim Brotherhood. It didn't turn out well. Roughly two years later the MB-backed government, which was rapidly proving to be fully as authoritarian and anti-democratic as its worst enemies feared, was itself overthrown.

This scenario repeated itself in Libya when Obama allied with the radical groups that wanted to overthrow Gaddafi. I had met with Gaddafi three times. His history of totalitarian leanings, support of terrorism and government-sponsored terrorist acts was awful. By 2004, however, he was willing to come in from the cold. Realizing it was in his own best interests, Gaddafi credibly told me and other American officials that he would pay reparations to those who died in the downing of Pan Am 103, dismantle his entire nuclear weapons program, and work with the U.S. to fight the threat from radical jihadists. After the U.S., under George W. Bush, renewed diplomatic ties with Libya in June 2004, Gaddafi set about fulfilling the pledges he'd made.

Under Obama that all changed. Ignoring the hard lessons of recent Middle East history again, Obama supported the efforts of radical groups to overthrow Gaddafi. By August of 2011 Gaddafi was gone.

And we all know what happened then. In 2012, U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and two other Americans were killed in Benghazi by the Libyan terrorist group Ansar al-Sharia. Also, secret shipments of arms were sent from Libya to the rebels in Syria who were attempting to overthrow the government of Bashar al-Assad. Some of the groups receiving arms from Libya, with at least the tacit support of the Obama administration, became the core of what the world would come to know as ISIS.

As if all that weren't enough, Libya lacks a functioning government to this day, ten years after Gaddafi was toppled with Obama's help.

Obama's record in Iran is arguably worst of all. In pursuit of a flawed nuclear deal, Obama lifted sanctions on the radical regime of the mullahs, the largest state sponsor of terrorism in the world, with proxies wreaking havoc in Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen, to name just the most blatant examples. As I write this, Lebanon has sunk into chaos, a failed state. Hezbollah continues to threaten Israel. A devastating war drags on in Yemen. A revitalized, violently anti-American Iran is the dominant power in Iraq. And Biden wants to revive Obama's foolish nuclear deal.

We see it now most clearly in Afghanistan: like Obama, Biden is effectively siding with the jihadists. The results are predictably the same: disaster. We may never know if Biden made some sort of implicit deal with the Taliban. Personally, I believe that the administration had at least an understanding with the Taliban. Biden probably thought he could limit the damage, but was then double-crossed by his jihadist negotiating partners. The people of Afghanistan, as we are seeing, will suffer significantly. The U.S. will be at greater risk from reinvigorated radical jihadist movements, not only the Taliban itself but also al-Qaeda and ISIS, who might well now have a new home base in a Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.

I don't know if Biden cares about history, but he certainly doesn't understand it. At any rate, he's reading from the failed playbook of his predecessor Obama.

How can he change course? Here are three must-do steps to implement right now. The Biden administration must:

1. Refuse with absolute consistency to work with radical Islamist groups. Exceptions to this rule must be limited to cases of absolute and immediate necessity. Never trust and always verify, verify, and verify.

2. Step up personal engagement with our allies at the highest level. This must be done by the president himself, not just by the secretary of state or the vice president. Our allies' confidence in America, and specifically this president, has been shaken severely.

3. Send powerful messages of support to Taiwan, Ukraine, Israel and our allies in Asia such as Japan and Australia especially. These are the partners most at risk because of Biden's failure in Afghanistan, and his inadequate responses to China and Russia, our other greatest adversaries.

4. Make it clear, now that the U.S. is at a much greater risk than just a few weeks ago, that any attack against the U.S. will be met with the harshest response.

To take these steps in a noticeable and credible manner will not be easy, especially given the skewed worldview of the Biden administration and its progressive base. But it must try. And as Americans, we must all help where we can. Republicans and Democrats must come together to send a message of unity to respond to this international crisis of confidence.

The alternative is not pretty, as we are already seeing. To paraphrase Patton, we've already read the Obama playbook that Biden has been following so far. America didn't like it then, and it won't like it now.

 

Pete Hoekstra is a former Representative in Congress from Michigan. He served as the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. More recently he was U.S. Ambassador to the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17669/biden-obama-jihadists

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Biden exhibits classic dementia symptoms - Terry Paulding

 

by Terry Paulding

  Even though the wokesters here can't see it, the rest of the world certainly can.

One of the hallmarks of dementia is an inability to feel empathy.  This study explains that cognitive decline causes significant impairment in identifying with the emotions and experiences of others.  There are many others, as well, that corroborate the observations.

Lead author Muireann Irish says:

There isn't the change in personality, which I think is one of the most jarring things about frontotemporal dementia patients. [This study] gives more knowledge and insight to the caregivers that there's an organic reason for this change that becomes so distressing. Empathy is an abstract concept in a way. It's not as easily quantified as memory loss or changes in language and it can be seen as a personality issue or somebody being deliberately unsympathetic, but this shows there's a region in the brain that changes.

Dare I suggest that the region of Joe's brain that once had a capacity for feeling others' pain is long gone?

Watching snippets (because that was all I could tolerate) of Biden's interactions with the public via the sparse speeches he read off the teleprompter between "resting" at Camp David, and then snippets of his interview with George Stephanopoulos, it's quite clear that the president has lost his ability to relate to the pain others may be feeling.

When asked if the current chaos "was always priced into the decision," Biden gave a simple "yes" and followed it with a delusional series of statements about the Taliban "letting" American citizens out.  Asked about plans to rescue our countrymen — thousands of them — he stated that they were on their own to get to the airport.  Asked about the people who fell to their deaths from departing airplanes, he responded that it was "four days ago."

The fact that it was only two is irrelevant, isn't it?  What really mattered is that he exhibited no empathy in any of these cases, while the rest of us recoiled in horror at the idea that our people had no realistic means to be rescued, just as we did as we watched the awful video of the desperate Afghans who fell to their deaths from our transport planes.

Another telling point came when Stephanopoulos told Biden that an Army Special Forces officer, while agreeing that it was time for us to leave Afghanistan, added, "I just wish we could've left with honor."  The transcript shows that Biden's response was an incomprehensible, rambling exposition about his son Beau's military service filled with factual errors, which drifted from any cogent point, with the only answer seeming to be "what's the alternative?" to a dishonorable retreat.

We will soon face the horrific realization that we have thousands of American citizens whom the Taliban are holding as hostages.  We will watch as the insurgents use our weaponry to murder and maim people on the streets.  We will suffer with the translators who helped us for years, as the Taliban uses our technology and the embassy payroll records we didn't bother to destroy to identify them, and murder them, most likely, with their families executed as well.

We will watch women become slaves or be shot for not wearing a burqa.  We will watch as schoolgirls are taken prisoner and raped, and as a society we lost soldiers to save is summarily destroyed.  We will also realize that the planes, tanks, and ordnance we left behind have been removed to the countries of our enemies, including China.

All of this makes it apparent that we don't have a president who is in charge, much less one with the capacity for empathy.  We assumed that he had staff surrounding him that could keep him from blundering his way into the destruction of the country, and it's apparent we were incorrect.  He obviously was not stopped or even questioned before executing his precipitous, disastrous plan.

We found out as well that Biden didn't communicate with the other countries involved in Afghanistan.  Finally, we saw quickly that Biden didn't even care enough about the crisis he has caused to stay in the White House and pay attention.  He's basically been on vacation since he did it.

We are no longer seen as reliable by our allies but have instead become the object of ridicule, a fallen society more concerned with transgender bathrooms and useless face masks than the safety and well-being of our own populace.  We will be held up as a prime example of a doomed, failed society.  Within our country, it is now apparent that the people in charge care nothing for their citizens, but only for their own aggrandizement and profit, and their presumptive position in the global economy.  Even though the wokesters here can't see it, the rest of the world certainly can.

As the next few days unfold, all of America will hopefully wake up from the dream state of the last eight months, and the sooner, the better.  The only problem is, as I hope we find the wherewithal to exercise the 25th Amendment to get rid of Biden before he does something even more rash (like start a nuclear war), we are faced with an incompetent cackler to take his place.  This is a woman who, as vice president, has abdicated all responsibility within her role, and has demonstrated nearly as bad judgment as Biden, but without the excuse of dementia.

God help us!

Image: Joe Biden.  Twitter screen grab.

To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here.

 

Terry Paulding

Source: https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2021/08/biden_exhibits_classic_dementia_symptoms.html

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China-Taliban connection – we must hold Beijing accountable for Afghan militants' crimes - Gordon G. Chang

 

by Gordon G. Chang

China’s ties with the Taliban go back before 9/11

Gordon Chang on Chinese President's 'menacing' message to the West

Gatestone Institute Senior Fellow Gordon Chang reacts to Chinese President Xi Jinping's hostile message to the west, arguing 'China believes it has the right to take territories from others.'

China has supplied weapons and logistical support to the Taliban for decades, and American presidents have ignored Beijing’s ties to the group, even when those weapons were used against American and NATO forces.

China’s embassy in Kabul has remained open in recent days, a sign Beijing worked out an arrangement with the Taliban during the swift failure of the Afghan government. 

Senior figures from the terror-harboring group, including co-founder Abdul Ghani Baradar, met with China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi in the Chinese city of Tianjin on July 28. American intelligence officials believe Beijing will recognize the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan soon.

JACK CARR: US HUBRIS IN AFGHANISTAN – HERE'S THE PRICE WE PAID FOR NOT LEARNING LESSONS OF HISTORY

China’s ties with the Taliban go back before 9/11. According to U.S. intelligence officials speaking without attribution to the Washington Times, Huawei Technologies and Zhongxing Telecom, also known as ZTE, were working on the telecom system in Kabul for two years prior to that horrific event. 

On Sept. 18, 2001, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhu Bangzao said, "China does not have any kind of formal relations with the Taliban." Beijing’s ties with the group, he said, were on "the working level," and he labeled reports that China was building telecom networks and dams for the Taliban as "unfounded rumors."

Huawei, China’s "national champion" telecom-networking-gear manufacturer, had a deep relationship with the Taliban. Electronic Engineering Times reported in December 2001 that Indian intelligence officials believed Huawei India supplied communications surveillance equipment to the Taliban in Afghanistan. Huawei denied the charges, and a Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman said the allegations were "misleading." 

BBC and other sources report that Beijing supplied the Taliban, even after Sept. 11, with surface-to-air missiles, anti-aircraft guns, landmines, rocket-propelled grenades and parts for roadside bombs as well as large-caliber sniper rifles and millions of rounds of ammunition. Some of these arms were shipped directly from China’s factories. Of particular concern was the Chinese shoulder-fired HN-5 antiaircraft missile. In short, China was a main supplier of small arms to the Taliban. 

Even though some of the equipment was routed through intermediaries in Iran and Pakistan, central Chinese authorities had to know what was happening as these arms were made in its state factories. Moreover, Beijing then, as it does now, operated a near-total surveillance state.

Should the Taliban once again allow Afghanistan to be used as a staging ground for terrorist attacks, Washington will have to hold accountable not only the Taliban but also the Taliban’s big-power sponsors.

Chinese arms merchants were villains, but Americans and others allowed them to be villainous. A series of U.S.  presidents – especially George W. Bush – looked the other way at China’s supply of weapons to the Taliban and insurgents in Iraq. 

There was never any justification for purposefully looking in the wrong direction. American leaders and policymakers, however, did not see it that way. Then, Washington was hopeful that it could integrate China’s regime into the international system, that the Chinese party-state would become a "responsible stakeholder" as then-Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick expressed in a now-famous 2005 speech. Most everyone wanted to "engage" China and so remained patient.

Video

After two decades of Chinese aggressive, malicious and provocative acts, that optimism is gone and tolerance is exhausted, not just in Washington but in capitals around the world. Now, no one can afford to overlook dangerous conduct.

Should the Taliban once again allow Afghanistan to be used as a staging ground for terrorist attacks, Washington will have to hold accountable not only the Taliban but also the Taliban’s big-power sponsors. That means, first and foremost, its most important backer, the People’s Republic of China.

 

Gordon G. Chang is the author of several books including "The Coming Collapse of China." Follow him on Twitter @GordonGChang.

Source: https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/china-taliban-connection-hold-beijing-accountable-gordon-chang

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Tucker Carlson sees coverup plot behind announcement FBI found little evidence of coordination among Jan. 6 demonstrators - Thomas Lifson

 

by Thomas Lifson

In the penultimate segment of the Friday edition of Tucker Carlson Tonight, he asked, “Why is the FBI exonerating people?” And there is a very disturbing answer.

Most conservative commentators have reacted with glee to a report from Reuters that:

The FBI has found scant evidence that the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol was the result of an organized plot to overturn the presidential election result, according to four current and former law enforcement officials.

“FBI Destroys Insurrection Narrative,” headlined Legal Insurrection. And it’s hard to avoid a sense of triumph that a ridiculous slur against Trump supporters, a plot worthy of comparison to the Reichstag Fire in its effort to discredit opposition, has been repudiated, albeit anonymously from 4 sources.

But Tucker Carlson, the most important conservative commentator of the moment, takes his reasoning a full step farther. In a segment of the Friday edition of Tucker Carlson Tonight, he asked, “Why is the FBI exonerating people?”

After reviewing the months of the 180 degrees opposite narrative, put out by the FBI and broadcast by the progressive media, that an organized insurrection took place, he suggests a sinister motive behind the leaked story to Reuters.  “If there was organization going on, some of it came from the feds.”

I note, as has often been the case, the FBI placed informants, or perhaps agents provocateur is the better term, among the demonstrators. In fact, there are upwards of 20 unindicted co-conspirators from the January 6 incident, and a good number of these may have been ringleaders on the FBI payroll, escaping prosecution for acts that were worse than the crimes for which others have been prosecuted.

In my view, dropping the allegations of coordinated activity, aka, insurrection, from the charges would allow these unindicted co-conspirators to avoid being called as witnesses by those who otherwise might have been charged with crimes of conspiracy.

Watch for yourself:

 

Photo credit: YouTube screengrab

Updated to clarify author's views

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Thomas Lifson

Source: https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2021/08/tucker_carlson_sees_coverup_plot_behind_announcement_fbi_found_little_evidence_of_coordination_among_jan_6_demonstrators_.html

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The Taliban and al-Qaeda: What Next? - Dr. James M. Dorsey

 

by Dr. James M. Dorsey

What is true for ISIS is not true for al-Qaeda and others such as the Uighur Turkestan Islamic Party (TIP) and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan.

A US leaflet used in Afghanistan in 2001, offering as $25 million reward for information leading to the whereabouts or capture Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri. (Image source: CIA/Wikimedia Commons)

BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 2,137, August 20, 2021

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: The Taliban proved that they value loyalty when they rejected US and Saudi pressure to hand over Osama bin Laden no matter the cost. The Taliban have since come to appreciate al-Qaeda’s fighting skills and contributions to the Afghan jihadists’ cause, and their return to power seems good news for the Islamist terrorist group.

Abu Omar Khorasani was taken from Kabul’s Pul-i-Charkhi prison and unceremoniously shot. The first and only person to have been executed since the Taliban gained full control of Afghanistan, Khorasani was ISIS head in South Asia until his arrest by government forces last year.

While the precise circumstances of his execution are not known, this move was, at least in part designed to send a message to the international community, especially to Afghanistan’s neighbors, including China and Iran, as well as Russia – Central Asia’s security overlord. The message was that the Taliban were cracking down on foreign jihadists and terrorists in Afghanistan.

Khorasani was an easy symbol. The relations between the Taliban and ISIS, whose ranks of foreigners are primarily populated by Pakistanis and a sprinkling of Central Asians, Uighurs, Russians, Turks, Iranians, Indonesians, Indians, and Frenchmen, have long been adversarial. ISIS recently accused the Taliban of being more nationalist than pious in their negotiations with the United States.

The Taliban message is quite misleading, though. What is true for ISIS is not true for al-Qaeda and others such as the Uighur Turkestan Islamic Party (TIP) and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan.

The Taliban appear to believe that they can get away with the differentiation because they perceived Washington as more focused during the withdrawal negotiations on ensuring that ISIS, al-Qaeda, and other terrorists will not be allowed to use Afghanistan as a springboard for international terrorism rather than on getting them expelled from the country. The perceived US focus may have been rooted in a concern that if the Taliban’s hands were forced, they would let terrorists slip out of the country and not hand them over to the authorities. That would make it difficult to control their movements or ensure that they are either entered into de-radicalization programs or, if warranted, brought to justice. “It’s a Catch-22. The Taliban ensuring that al-Qaeda sticks to rule risks putting a fox in charge of the chicken coop. How much better that is than having foxes run wild remains to be seen,” said a retired counterterrorism official.

Officials of the Trump administration who negotiated the agreement suggest that the continued presence of al-Qaeda and other terrorists in Afghanistan would violate the accord with the Taliban. Former Vice President Mike Pence as well as Trump-era State Department counterterrorism coordinator Nathan Sales argued that the deal “required the Taliban…to refuse terrorists safe harbor.”

Russia and China, while publicly more measured in their statements, are likely to share western concerns. Moscow held military drills earlier this month with Tajik and Uzbek troops in Tajikistan, 20 kilometers from the border with Afghanistan.

While al-Qaeda may have been boosted in recent weeks by multiple prison breaks in which the Taliban freed al-Qaeda terrorists (as well as jihadists from other groups), it remains unclear to what degree the breaks will help the group strengthen its presence in Afghanistan. General Mark Milley, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned this week that al-Qaeda and ISIS could quickly rebuild their networks in Afghanistan.

The United Nations recently reported that al-Qaeda “is present in at least 15 Afghan provinces”, and that its affiliate in the Indian subcontinent “operates under Taliban protection from Kandahar, Helmand and Nimruz provinces.”

“Without information on who exactly escaped, it is difficult to determine whether historically significant figures remain within AQ’s AfPak [Afghanistan-Pakistan] network, or if it is mainly composed of newer figures these days, whether local or regional foreign fighters,” cautioned political violence scholar Aaron Zelin. It is also unclear whether al-Qaeda terrorists in Iran will be allowed to relocate to Afghanistan.

The prison breaks cast doubts about the Taliban’s readiness to police jihadists and other terrorists with aspirations beyond Afghanistan’s borders. Of particular concern is the fact that the balance of power has yet to be determined between Taliban leaders who in recent days have been eager to put a seemingly more moderate, accommodating foot forward with security guarantees for their opponents, minorities and women and the group’s far-flung less polished rank and file.

The concern about the Taliban’s ability and willingness to control terrorist activity on Afghan soil is magnified by worries regarding the continued existence of warlords with the power to organize violence, provide jobs and public services, and forge or strengthen ties with terrorists. “Warlords will play an active role in the future of Afghanistan. They will remain businessmen and political leaders, connected to global economic processes and networks. They will develop the military power that they need to control territory and wage war. They will, finally, continue to fight for more autonomy and, in some cases, might even manage to partially form their old regional polities once again,” said Romain Malejacq, author of a book on Afghan warlords. “Afghanistan’s availability as a sanctuary for terrorists is, to say the least, related to its status as a warlord-ridden wasteland,” said journalist and author Graeme Wood.

The Taliban’s refusal to expel terrorists not only complicates the group’s efforts to garner legitimacy in the international community and particularly its neighbors, even if al-Qaeda has been significantly weakened since 9/11 and is less focused on attacking the United States and more on the Muslim world.

It also strengthens those who fear that Afghanistan will again emerge as a launching pad for transnational political violence. “We are going to go back to a pre-9/11 state – a breeding ground for terrorism,” warned Michael McCaul, the ranking Republican member of the US House Foreign Affairs Committee. “They (the Taliban) will not restrict terrorist groups, just ask them to operate low-key,” added Douglas London, a former head of CIA counterterrorism operations for South and Southwest Asia.

The Taliban proved already 20 years ago that they valued loyalty when they rejected US and Saudi pressure to hand over Osama bin Laden no matter the cost. The Taliban have since come to appreciate al-Qaeda’s fighting skills and contributions to the Afghan jihadists’ cause. Taliban fighters this week, in a violation of their pledge to inclusiveness, demonstrated their ideological anti-Shiite affinity with al-Qaeda by blowing up a statue of Abdul Ali Mazari, a Shiite Hazara militia leader killed by the Taliban when they first took power in 1996.

 

Dr. James M. Dorsey, a non-resident Senior Associate at the BESA Center, is a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University and co-director of the University of Würzburg’s Institute for Fan Culture.

Source: https://besacenter.org/taliban-al-qaeda/

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Fatah: There will be no peace without return of 'refugees' - Dalit Halevy

 

by Dalit Halevy

Fatah movement led by Mahmoud Abbas stresses that the Temple Mount belongs only to Muslims.

 

PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas tours Ramallah

Flash90

The Fatah movement, led by Mahmoud Abbas, stated once again that the city of Jerusalem and the holy sites of Islam and Christianity in it are a "red line" and that the Al-Aqsa Mosque (Temple Mount area) belongs only to Muslims who will not accept an order that would see its use split with Jews.

In a statement issued by the movement marking the 52nd anniversary of the burning of the Al-Aqsa Mosque by Denis Michael Rohan, a young Australian Christian to whom the statement referred as a "Zionist," Fatah stressed that the Palestinians guarding the Al-Aqsa Mosque would thwart Israeli plans and Jerusalem would remain the eternal capital of the free and independent Palestinian state.

The Fatah movement also clarified that there would be no peace or stability in the region without the liberation of Jerusalem, the establishment of a free and independent state of Palestine and the return of refugees.

The movement sent congratulations to the residents of Jerusalem who stand firm and defend the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Arab neighborhoods in Jerusalem, emphasizing that the will of the Palestinian people is stronger than the Israeli war machine, and that the "ethnic cleansing" policy will not succeed since the Palestinians stand by "the historical homeland."

 

Dalit Halevy

Source: https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/312159

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Joe Biden, Cooing Cannibal - Jeffrey Folkes

 

by Jeffrey Folks

Joe Biden speaks with the insidious tone of the political predator intent on consuming everyone and everything.

I listened to part of President Biden's recent speech congratulating himself upon Senate passage of the $1.9-trillion infrastructure bill — a "bipartisan" plan that seventeen Republicans were foolish enough to support.  The "Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act," as it's called, is a mammoth boondoggle laden with union favoritism and minority set-asides — the most corrupt piece of legislation yet, though overshadowed by the proposed $5-trillion American Families Act.

Once again, what stood out was that creepy, sotto voce delivery, leaning into the camera with the look of one who's got what he wants but wants more.  Biden's delivery was not only strange; it was sinister.  What I heard in Biden's delivery was a politician intent on concentrating power in Washington — for his party, for himself, forever.  

In this kind of Hannibal Lecter moment, Biden's voice is truly disturbing because it reveals what no politician should admit: that he lives for power and that power is built upon the ruin of others — the hundreds of millions of Americans who will be harmed, and who are already beginning to be harmed, by Biden's spending plans.  In moments like this, Biden reveals himself as a political kleptomaniac, bound on taking everything and always in the name of doing good "for the children," for the women, for the poor, for the "people of color," for those who are "struggling" and "just need a little help."

The text of Biden's speech begins with the familiar claim that he intends to "transform America ... changing the pattern of life in America."  That is something none of us should wish for.  American life has been, until recently at least, the freest, most affluent, most comfortable and rewarding life on the planet.  Why should we wish to surrender our freedom for a centralized economy in which our speech and behavior, as well as our salaries and job opportunities and education from pre-school to college, are all controlled by the State?

Maybe because he hobnobs with Francophiles like John Kerry, Biden wants the USA to become like France: less affluent (the USA is 62% more affluent than France), less free, less able to defend itself.  Maybe Biden is aiming for his own Légion d'Honneur like the one Kerry got back in 2016.  What progressives like Biden and Kerry really love about France is its concentration of power in the State, and in a State run by a permanent political elite educated at the best schools and nearly impossible to dislodge.

Biden's speech insists that the wealth redistribution in this bill is a form of "investment," a favorite and particularly dishonest word in the progressive vocabulary.  A true investment assumes that a financial return above and beyond the sum invested will accrue or is expected to accrue.  In the case of government "investment," there is no hint of "return on investment" or even, in many cases, of where the money was spent to begin with.  The purpose of government spending is to secure votes and retain power.

One of the precedents cited for the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act is the highly controversial government backing of the Erie Canal, which was completed in 1825 just as the more efficient system of railroads began operating.  It's ironic that the Albany and Schenectady Railroad was chartered in 1826 and completed in 1831, along with the other carriers that would become the mighty New York Central Railroad, causing canal traffic to peak in 1855 and quickly decline thereafter.  Rail traffic was much faster than canal traffic and offered service to more stations.

Now Biden wants to build his own Erie Canal — a national system of charging stations intended to promote E.V. purchases (which were only 4% of vehicles in 2020).  Government planning always produces boondoggles even as it rewards corporatist supporters, like those who threw the 2020 presidential election to Biden.  If Biden gets his way, America will be plastered with charging stations, but how many of them will be used, and how long until they become superseded by other technology?

The bill would also provide high-speed internet to the poor and to those in rural areas and "upgrade our power grid" so, Biden promises, outages like those in Texas don't occur again.  Biden has a short memory span: the problem in Texas was windmills and solar cells freezing up and being covered with ice, not the power grid.  Now, just as scientists are predicting colder temperatures in the USA as a result of global warming (huh?), Biden wants E.V.s so as to lower the temperature further by burning more coal and natural gas to produce the energy to run them.  Logic was never the president's strong suit.

Further, Biden stated that "everyone ... believe that" [sic] the infrastructure bill will involve a "multiplier effect" — it will result in "billions" in future savings (off a $1.9-trillion "investment") and create 2 million jobs, most of which "won't require a college degree."  I've nothing against blue-collar work, but what's wrong with workers who take the trouble to educate themselves?

At times one couldn't tell what Biden was saying in the speech, as when he announced: "everyone can tell you what the most dangerous intersections in their communities are.  There's money in there to deal with those pac- — those specific needs."  What are those "pac-"s, anyway?  Or when those lead pipes are "finally going to rep- — be replaced."  Or high-speed internet, "so farmers nationwide can get the brest [sic] prices."

After congratulating himself on the infrastructure bill, Biden launched into the American Families Plan, a bill more than twice as expensive and far more "transformational" than infrastructure spending.  This monstrosity contains everything from child care and elder care to home renovation and purchase (the kind of "investment" that led to the last great recession in 2008–9), all paid for with the largest corporate tax increase in American history and with higher taxes on the most productive Americans.

Biden closed by insisting that "nobody, nobody, nobody gets hurt."  (Again, that eerie soft-spoken, lean-into-the-camera fake earnestness in his manner.)  Well, the truth is that "everybody, everybody, everybody gets hurt," just as everybody did in 2008–9 as a result of progressive "free housing" policies.  Not just businesses with their taxes doubled and affluent professionals paying higher taxes, but ordinary Americans harmed by inflation, job losses, and lower wages.

That soft voice — soft, but not kind — is the voice of Big Brother, convinced that he now has you in his grip.  It is the cannibal, calmly explaining why he must devour you, the tyrant as he calmly orders millions to their deaths, the unfeeling lisp of abuse.  What sort of tone will he adopt to announce that thousands of Afghan allies, many of them interpreters for U.S. forces, have been executed just as 22 Afghan Special Forces members were in Faryab Province on August 10?

Conservatives should listen to Biden, to what he is saying and how he is saying it.  Biden is not the senile old fool, the puppet that some believe he is.  He is a cunning, manipulative, totally political animal with a lifetime of experience in duplicity.  Biden's unnatural speaking voice, with its veneer of kindness and its heart of menace, is far from selfless — it is the insidious tone of the political predator intent on consuming everyone and everything.  Listen to Biden, and consider whether you wish to be devoured.

Image: Gage Skidmore via Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0.

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Jeffrey Folks is the author of many books and articles on American culture including Heartland of the Imagination (2011).

Source: https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2021/08/joe_biden_cooing_cannibal.html

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Biden's Afghanistan Disaster Has Left the West Defenseless against Islamist Terrorists - Con Coughlin

 

by Con Coughlin

The fear now is that, as Western intelligence agencies are no longer able to monitor the activities of Islamist extremists both in Afghanistan and in neighbouring countries like Pakistan and Iran, the West will find itself increasingly vulnerable to high profile terror attacks as a direct consequence of Mr Biden's disastrous withdrawal plan.

• The fear now is that, as Western intelligence agencies are no longer able to monitor the activities of Islamist extremists both in Afghanistan and in neighbouring countries like Pakistan and Iran, the West will find itself increasingly vulnerable to high profile terror attacks as a direct consequence of Mr Biden's disastrous withdrawal plan.

• An important first step for the security of the United States would be immediately to shut its southern border.

• The alarming implications, in terms of Western security, of a Taliban takeover of Afghanistan are clearly an issue the Biden administration failed to take into consideration when deciding to abandon Afghanistan to its fate. It is an oversight that adds to the scale of the disaster that Mr Biden has just inflicted on the security of the Western alliance.

The ability of U.S. security officials to monitor and disrupt the activities of Islamist terror groups will be severely diminished as a consequence of the Biden administration's catastrophic decision to end America's military involvement in Afghanistan. Pictured: A Taliban patrol on a street in Kabul on August 17, 2021. (Photo by Wakil Kohsar/AFP via Getty Images)

The ability of U.S. security officials to monitor and disrupt the activities of Islamist terror groups will be severely diminished as a consequence of the Biden administration's catastrophic decision to end America's military involvement in Afghanistan.

One of the most notable achievements of the US-led coalition's presence in Afghanistan during the past two decades has been its relentless campaign to destroy the terrorist infrastructure of Islamist terror groups such as Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda organisation.

In the years immediately following the September 11th attacks in 2001, American and other intelligence agencies estimated that around 80 percent of Islamist-inspired terror plots against the West originated from Afghanistan or the lawless tribal territories on the Pakistani border.

Today that figure has been reduced to almost zero, as the highly successful counter-terrorism campaign mounted by the U.S. and key allies like Britain against Afghan-based Islamist terror cells has seen their infrastructure destroyed, and their ability to wreak havoc against the West curtailed.

The success of the American-led campaign has resulted in groups like al-Qaeda, as well as more recent Islamist organisations like ISIS, being forced to locate their operations to other failed states, such as Syria and Libya.

Following this week's dramatic collapse of the Western-backed Afghan government of President Ashraf Ghani and its replacement by the Taliban, senior Western intelligence officials are becoming increasingly concerned about their ability to continue monitoring the activities of Islamist terror cells in Afghanistan, as well as neighbouring countries.

Reports have already surfaced in recent days of al-Qaeda supporters flocking to join the Taliban as it intensified its campaign to seize control of the country through force of arms.

ISIS terror cells are also known to be actively involved in Afghanistan and have been accused of carrying out some of the most deadly attacks against civilian targets, including the 2020 joint attack on a hospital maternity ward and funeral procession in Kabul that left 56 dead and more than 100 wounded.

The fear now is that, as Western intelligence agencies are no longer able to monitor the activities of Islamist extremists both in Afghanistan and in neighbouring countries like Pakistan and Iran, the West will find itself increasingly vulnerable to high profile terror attacks as a direct consequence of Mr Biden's disastrous withdrawal plan.

Of particular concern for Western intelligence and security officials is the fate of Afghanistan's highly respected intelligence service, the National Directorate of Security (NDS), whose officers have played a central role in the U.S.-led coalition's long-running campaign against the Taliban and its terrorist affiliates.

Unlike Pakistan's ISI intelligence service, which has actively supported the Taliban and famously provided al-Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden with a safe house, the NDS has won many plaudits from American and other Western intelligence agencies for the bravery and courage they have displayed in taking the fight to the Taliban during the past two decades.

But now that the Islamist militants control the entire machinery of the Afghan government, NDS officers and their families have been abandoned to an uncertain fate by the Biden administration, one where their lives are at risk of reprisals by the Taliban.

As one senior Western intelligence officer told Gatestone after the Taliban seized power earlier this week, there is a great deal of anger and resentment within Western intelligence circles at the way their erstwhile Afghan allies have been abandoned to their fate. "These guys risked their lives on a daily basis for the coalition cause, and now the Biden administration is treating them as though they did not exist.

"The fact that we will no longer able to work with our former Afghan colleagues to monitor the activities of the Taliban and Islamist terror groups like ISIS and al-Qaeda leaves the West wide open to attack from terror cells based in Afghanistan and surrounding countries."

An important first step for the security of the United States would be immediately to shut its southern border.

The Taliban's dramatic seizure of power this week has certainly been a cause for celebration among jihadi extremists if their reaction to the power grab on social media is anything to go by.

Social media accounts sympathetic to al-Qaeda, for example, published an unsigned message shortly after the Taliban takeover congratulating "the brothers" in the movement on their victory. "Afghanistan is Conquered and Islam has won", read the message which was translated by the SITE intelligence group, which monitors extremist media.

Western counter-terrorism officials are also concerned that militant groups like al-Qaeda will be boosted after the Taliban released thousands of prisoners held at Kabul's Bagram Air Base, once the nerve centre of the coalition war effort, as well as Pul-e-Charkhi, another Afghan prison on the outskirts of Kabul.

The alarming implications, in terms of Western security, of a Taliban takeover of Afghanistan are clearly an issue the Biden administration failed to take into consideration when deciding to abandon Afghanistan to its fate. It is an oversight that adds to the scale of the disaster that Mr Biden has just inflicted on the security of the Western alliance.

 

Con Coughlin is the Telegraph's Defence and Foreign Affairs Editor and a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Gatestone Institute.

Source: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17659/afghanistan-disaster-biden

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What Did Hezbollah Learn This Month? - Caroline Glick

 

by Caroline Glick

The likelihood that Hezbollah will start a major war against Israel has increased significantly.

 

 

The likelihood that Hezbollah will start a major war against Israel increased significantly in the wake of its Aug. 6 missile attack.

Hezbollah attacked Israel with 20 missiles because the outcome of Hamas’s offensive against the Jewish state in May convinced Iran’s foreign legion in Lebanon that it would only gain from aggression.

Three months ago, Hamas opened an unprovoked missile assault against Israel and incited Israeli Muslims to launch pogroms against Israeli Jews in cities across the country.

Israel responded to Hamas’s aggression with pinpoint airstrikes that targeted the terror group’s military infrastructure and command and control mechanisms and bases.

For its painstaking efforts to limit its strikes to military targets, Israel was pilloried as a racist, illegitimate state and threatened with an arms embargo by progressives in the U.S. Congress. Jews were attacked on the streets from Los Angeles to New York to Paris and London.

On the other hand, Hamas was celebrated. Even as it rained down missiles on Tel Aviv, the international community, led by the Biden administration, pledged hundreds of millions of dollars in “humanitarian aid” to Gaza. To date, Hamas has received nearly a billion dollars in pledges, and the money is already flowing in by the tens of millions.

Before it launched its offensive against Israel. Hamas was on the economic ropes. It had squandered the resources, destroyed the infrastructure and sucked dry the earning capacity of the denizens of Gaza, which it has controlled since 2007. But now, thanks to its latest illegal war of aggression against the Jews, it has the economic wherewithal to keep its terror fiefdom afloat.

For Hamas, its Iranian controllers and its fellow Iranian proxy Hezbollah, the lesson of May’s terror offensive is that attacking the Jewish state is the best economic development plan. It rendered sanctions relief for Iran unnecessary.

Iran can keep spinning its centrifuges and the U.S. and Europe will fund its terror arms for it.

Like Hamas’s situation in Gaza, since Hezbollah seized control over the Lebanese government through elections in 2007 and military force in 2008, the Iranian group has turned what was once the banking capital of the Middle East into an economic death trap. Lebanon defaulted on its loans. Its infrastructure is destroyed. Its people are going hungry and living without electricity or fuel, or prospects for earning a living. So Hezbollah decided to test out Hamas’s economic plan with a limited missile strike to see what would happen.

And it worked. All Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah needed were 19 measly missiles to hit the jackpot.

On Tuesday, the Lebanese media reported that the Biden administration intends to transfer $100 million in aid to the Lebanese Health Ministry for assistance in managing the COVID-19 pandemic. Notably, although unsaid in the report, was the fact that Hezbollah has controlled Lebanon’s Health Ministry since 2019.

The Lebanese Armed Forces are also set to receive a boost in U.S. support following Hezbollah’s attack. In testimony before the Senate this week, Mira Resnick, Assistant Deputy Secretary of State for Regional Affairs, gushed that the LAF “is one of our most competent partners in the Middle East.”

US economic assistance to Hezbollah

As to Israel, not only did it barely respond to Hezbollah’s wanton aggression, it joined the United States in loudly advocating on behalf of economic assistance to Iran’s Hezbollah-run colony. In a tour of the border zone with Lebanon, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz restated his desire to give money to Hezbollah’s satrapy to keep the country from collapsing.

The U.S. and Israeli responses to Hezbollah’s aggression taught the terror army important—and dangerous—lessons about how it should advance its interests going forward.

As far as the Biden administration is concerned, Nasrallah learned the U.S. policy of appeasing Iran extends to its proxies, as well. To win over the ayatollahs in Iran, U.S. President Joe Biden and his advisers now believe it is the responsibility of the United States to protect Hezbollah (and Hamas) from Israel. It wasn’t coincidence that stood behind the administration’s decision to tell Arab media outlets that Israel’s decision to give Hezbollah a pass for its aggression was spurred by U.S. pressure.

The administration wanted to send a message to Hezbollah and Iran that Washington has their back. And they wanted to make sure that the Lebanese people and the Sunni Arab states threatened by Iran also understood that the Biden administration now sides with Iran’s terror proxies against Israel and other U.S. allies.

Underscoring the administration’s refusal to consider any policy other than appeasement towards Iran, Bloomberg reported last week that the administration is coming to terms with the fact that Iran will not agree to return to the 2015 nuclear deal. That deal requires Iran to temporarily scale down some of its nuclear operations in exchange for massive economic support and reintegration into the international economy.

In selecting the mass-murdering terrorist Ebrahim Raisi to serve as president, the regime has demonstrated irrefutably that it will not respond cooperatively to U.S. efforts.

Rather than reconsider its commitment to appeasement in light of the new reality, Bloomberg reported the administration has decided to ask less from Iran. Instead of getting sanctions relief for accepting the nuclear restraints it accepted in the 2015 deal, the administration intends to offer the cancellation of some sanctions in exchange for some restraints on some nuclear activities.

This brings us to Israel. According to the Arab media reports, the U.S. demanded that Israel not respond to Hezbollah’s aggression out of a fear that significant Israeli retaliation would make Iran even more unwilling to reinstate its pointless negotiations with the Americans. Israel’s decision to accede to Washington’s pressure showed Nasrallah Israel will take no action to defend itself against Iran or its proxies without U.S. permission.

True, the government denied the report that it stood down due to U.S. pressure. But the Arab media reasonably dismissed the denial. To date, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and his senior partner Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, along with Gantz, have toed the U.S. line on every major effort. They have committed to a “no surprises” policy on Iran that gives Washington veto power over all Israeli actions against Iranian aggression and nuclear operations.

Bennett supports aid to Gaza, PA

Bennett has also aligned himself with the United States on Hamas and more broadly on the Palestinian Authority. He supports “humanitarian aid” to Gaza. And according to Arab Affairs expert Yoni Ben Menahem, Bennett has even agreed to provide budgetary assistance to the Palestinian Authority and pave the way for a renewal of massive U.S. assistance to the PA despite the fact that the PA continues to pay the salaries of terrorists serving time in Israeli prisons, as well as the families of Palestinian terrorists.

Both U.S. and Israeli law bans financial support to the PA so long as the terror payments are maintained.

The government has bowed to U.S. and European Union pressure and permitted mass building for Palestinians in the strategically vital Area C of Judea and Samaria, and is significantly constraining Israeli construction in Judea and Samaria communities.

Bennett is even falling into line with the administration on Jerusalem. He supports a “compromise” offered by the Supreme Court on the Shimon HaTzadik/Sheikh Jarrah lawsuit. The lawsuit surrounds the efforts by Jewish owners of buildings in the neighborhood, illegally occupied by Palestinian squatters, to secure physical control over their property.

Siding with the squatters, the Biden administration and the European Union demand that the property rights of the Jews be seized and transferred to the illegal squatters simply because the owners are Jews.

Before issuing a ruling, the Supreme Court offered a “compromise” that would block the Jewish owners from regaining control over their buildings and leave the Palestinian squatters on the premises but compel the squatters to acknowledge that the Jews own the buildings. According to news reports, rather than reject the offer, which discriminates against the lawful owners simply because they are Jews, Bennett has asked the Biden administration to convince the squatters to accept the court’s offer.

Watering down Israeli sovereignty over Jerusalem

Like many Israelis, Hezbollah understands that when Israel’s government is willing to bow to U.S. pressure to water down its sovereignty over Jerusalem and break its own laws to finance a PA that pays salaries to terrorists and their families; when the government is willing to give the pro-Iranian Biden administration veto power over its efforts to block Iran from becoming an nuclear state, it will certainly not make a move in Lebanon without a green light from Washington (which will never come).

Hezbollah learned something else, as well, from the government’s statements and actions in the aftermath of its missile attack. It learned that Bennett, Gantz and Lapid don’t understand the political realities in Lebanon and that as a consequence, their strategy for fighting Hezbollah, when and if they ever do, will only advance Hezbollah’s interests.

Defense Ministry sources told the Breaking Defense website that ahead of a future assault, Israel “has prepared a collection of targets in Lebanon, including critical infrastructure whose destruction is designed to put political pressure on Hezbollah.”

But as we saw last weekend, Hezbollah is immune to political pressure, because it controls Lebanon through force. The missiles were launched against Israel by a mobile missile squad operating from a Druze border village. The local villagers responded with fury to the use of their lands as a launching pad. They attacked the missile crew and seized their missile launchers. Members of the missile squad were detained and their launchers were seized.

But three days later, the vaunted LAF, working with Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, released the squad members and returned the missile launcher to Nasrallah’s field commanders. Whether they like it or not, Jumblatt and the LAF recognize that they cannot get into a fight with Hezbollah. The terror army is too powerful. Attacking civilian infrastructure in Lebanon to put political pressure on Hezbollah is like attacking a school in Afghanistan to put pressure on the Taliban. They couldn’t care less.

And anyway, if Israel destroys Lebanese infrastructure, the Biden administration will finance its reconstruction.

Early this week, Raisi hosted the heads of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Tehran. According to reports of the meeting, its purpose was to intensify military cooperation between Iran and its Palestinian proxy armies. The Israel Defense Forces is reportedly operating under the assumption that in the next war, Israel will be attacked simultaneously from the north and south by Hezbollah and Hamas.

There is one thing that the government can do to reduce the chances of war, or at a minimum, increase the chance that if war does indeed break out, Israel will emerge stronger and its enemies will be weakened.

If the government cancels its “zero surprises” commitment to Washington and acts unilaterally against Iran, or against its proxies (or both), or if it simply defends the property rights of Jews in Jerusalem and announces that it will refuse the administration’s plan to open a consulate to the Palestinians in its capital, it will change the dynamic that is catapulting it into a war it is ill-prepared to fight or win. Unfortunately, given the government’s behavior and its temperament, there is little reason to believe that this will happen.

 

Caroline Glick is an award-winning columnist and author of “The Israeli Solution: A One-State Plan for Peace in the Middle East.”

Source: https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/08/what-did-hezbollah-learn-month-caroline-glick/

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