Top Islamic Leader Calls on U.S. to Wage 'Jihad for Allah'

by Raymond Ibrahim


A video of Dr. Yusuf al-Qaradawi calling on the U.S. government to wage jihad for Allah in Syria, is currently making the rounds on Arabic media and Facebook, to mockery and dismay.

In the recorded speech, Qaradawi—one of the most influential Islamic clerics in the world, spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, author of over 100 books on Muslim doctrine, and head of the International Union of Muslim Scholars—sarcastically thanks the U.S. for supporting the "freedom fighters" in Syria, adding that "Allah willing, your [U.S.] aid will increase."

Yusuf al-Qaradawi (c) draped in a "Free Syria" flag. (Image source: Wikimedia Commons)

Then, while working himself up because the U.S is only providing weapons to the jihadis in Syria, as opposed to directly intervening, Qaradawi declares in frustration: "We want America to take a manly stand—a stand for Allah!"

Needless to say, all Muslim Brotherhood opponents in the region are pointing to this as yet more proof that Qaradawi and the Brotherhood are mercenaries who interpret jihad any which way, so long as it helps them consolidate power: otherwise, how can "infidel" America take "a stand for Allah" by waging jihad on fellow Muslims?

It should further be noted that the classic formulation of the Arabic word jihad, as in "fight," appears in the Koran with the addition fi sabil Allah, that is, "fight in the cause of Allah."

In other words, calling on the U.S. to strike Syria's Bashar Assad—and calling it "a stand for Allah"—is essentially synonymous with calling on the U.S. to fight "in the cause of Allah."
Amazingly, then, Qaradawi employs classical jihadi rhetoric to incite American leadership to action.

As one televised political commentator in Egypt discussing this anecdote put it,

Sheikh Qaradawi of course is the great and prominent Sheikh of Jihad, who issues those famous fatwas we all know of to kill and destroy on his orders. Really, the man has reached the point where he is now calling on America to wage jihad and take a stand for Allah. No comment; what's there to say at this point?… Now jihad is being asked of America and to be waged against Muslims.

Nor is it any secret that this administration does act on the calls of Qaradawi. As Clare Lopez summarizes for the Gatestone Institute:

[T]he current administration consistently and repeatedly appeared to respond eagerly to the calls for revolution from the Muslim Brotherhood's senior Islamic scholar, Yousef al-Qaradawi. When al-Qaradawi said that Mubarak had to go, the U.S. waited a whole three days before throwing America's key ally in the Middle East for over three decades under the bus. When al-Qaradawi called for Libyan rebels to kill Muammar Qaddafi (so the al-Qa'eda jihadis in his jails could get out and join the revolution), the U.S. led the Western military campaign that brought al-Qa'eda, the MB, and chaos to Libya. And when al-Qaradawi issued a call for jihad in Syria, in early June 2013, the U.S. quickly issued an invitation to Abdullah bin Bayyah (al-Qaradawi's vice president at the International Union of Muslim Scholars), who told an Al-Jazeera reporter that, "We demand Washington take a greater role in [Syria]." It took the U.S. less than one week after al-Qaradawi's fatwa to announce authorization of stepped-up military aid to the al-Qa'eda-and-Brotherhood-dominated Syrian rebels. The White House announcement came just a single day after bin Bayyah met with National Security and other senior administration officials.

The problem, then, is not that Qaradawi has in desperate senility confused the U.S. with the jihadis, but rather that he may know that prominent elements of U.S. leadership are committed to struggling "in the cause of Allah"—and so he unwittingly employed jihadi rhetoric to remind them of their duty.

Unfortunately, in today's surreal climate of U.S. politics, no interpretation is so absurd as to be implausible.


Raymond Ibrahim, author of Crucified Again: Exposing Islam's New War on Christians (Regnery, April, 2013) is a Middle East and Islam specialist, and a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and an Associate Fellow at the Middle East Forum.
 
Source: http://www.meforum.org/3734/qaradawi-us-jihad

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Spain Rethinks Universal Jurisdiction

by Soeren Kern

Worried that Spain's judicial system was being hijacked by activist judges pursuing a political agenda, Spanish lawmakers voted...to restrict the scope of universal jurisdiction.
"Universal jurisdiction risks creating universal tyranny -- that of judges." — Henry Kissinger

Lawmakers from Spain's ruling center-right Popular Party have submitted a bill that would limit the conditions under which Spanish judges can investigate genocide or crimes against humanity committed outside the borders of Spain.

The move—which comes just weeks after a Spanish judge issued arrest warrants for five high-ranking Chinese officials over alleged human rights abuses in Tibet—would restrict the reach of Spain's law on universal jurisdiction only to those cases directly involving Spanish citizens or foreign nationals habitually resident in Spain.

Universal jurisdiction is a legal concept whereby states can claim criminal jurisdiction over persons whose alleged crimes were committed outside the boundaries of the prosecuting state, regardless of nationality, country of residence, or any other relation with the prosecuting country.

Spanish judges have gained a reputation for activism in recent years by using the principle of universal jurisdiction to pursue cases against suspected human rights violators overseas, most famously the former Chilean dictator, General Augusto Pinochet.

Spanish magistrates have pursued more than a dozen international investigations into suspected cases of torture, genocide and crimes against humanity, in places as far-flung as Gaza, Guatemala, Iraq and Rwanda. But many of these cases have little or no connection with Spain, and critics say the judges are interpreting the concept of universal jurisdiction too loosely.

Calls to restrict the scope of universal jurisdiction reached a crescendo in 2009 when Spanish magistrates announced highly politicized probes involving Israel and the United States. In January of that year, Spanish Judge Fernando Andreu said he would probe seven top Israeli military and government officials for alleged "crimes against humanity" in the 2002 targeted assassination of Salah Shehadeh, the commander of the military wing of Hamas.

In March 2009, Baltasar Garzón, Spain's most high-profile judge at the time, invoked the principle of universal jurisdiction to investigate six former Bush administration officials for allegedly giving legal cover to torture committed at the U.S. detention center in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

And in May 2009, another Spanish judge, Santiago Pedraz, said he would charge three U.S. soldiers with crimes against humanity for the April 2003 deaths of a Spanish television cameraman and a Ukrainian journalist. The men were killed when a U.S. tank crew shelled their Baghdad hotel.

The legal standoff came to a head after Andreu rejected requests by Spanish prosecutors to suspend the lawsuit against Israel because Israel was already investigating the case. Several days later, Pedraz said he would continue to pursue his case against the American GIs, even though a National Criminal Court panel, as well as a U.S. Army investigation, recommended that no action be taken.

At the time, Spain's then Attorney General, Cándido Conde-Pumpido, asked Garzón to shelve his case against the Americans and warned of the risks of turning the Spanish justice system into a "plaything" for politically motivated prosecutions. Garzón ignored that advice and launched yet another investigation seeking information on individuals responsible for the alleged torture of four inmates at Guantánamo. (Garzón has since been disbarred for overstepping his authority.)

Baltasar Garzón was a Spanish judge known for invoking universal jurisdiction. (Image source: Agencia de Noticias Andes)

Worried that Spain's judicial system was being hijacked by activist judges pursuing a political agenda, Spanish lawmakers in the Congress of Deputies (lower house) voted in June 2009 to restrict the future scope of universal jurisdiction to cases in which: a) the victims are Spanish; b) the alleged perpetrators are in Spain; or c) there exists some other clear link to Spanish interests. That bill was approved by the Spanish Senate in October 2009 and became law in November 2009.

Despite these restrictions, Spanish judges have not lost their fervor for pursuing high-profile human rights cases based on the concept of universal jurisdiction.

In October 2013, Spanish High Court Judge Ismael Moreno indicted former Chinese President Hu Jintao, 71, for allegedly committing genocide in Tibet, an autonomous region in southwestern China. Moreno said he was competent to rule in the case, which was brought by two Spanish pro-Tibet groups, because one of the activists, Tibetan monk Thubten Wangchen, is a Spanish citizen.

In their lawsuit against Hu Jintao, the Madrid-based Tibetan Support Committee (Comité de Apoyo al Tibet) and the Barcelona-based Tibet House Foundation (Fundació Casa del Tibet) allege that, as Communist Party leader, he was ultimately responsible for actions "aimed at eliminating the uniqueness and existence of Tibet as a country, imposing martial law, carrying out forced deportations, mass sterilization campaigns and torture of dissidents."

In November 2013, Moreno issued an arrest warrant for former Chinese President Jiang Zemin, 87, and former Prime Minister Li Peng, 85, as well as three other former high-ranking Chinese officials, over allegations they too committed genocide in Tibet. Moreno said there was sufficient evidence against the five officials to have them appear for questioning in a Spanish court.

The arrest warrants mean the individuals could be detained when they travel to Spain or any other country that has an extradition treaty with Spain.

Chinese officials have—naturally—reacted with anger over Spain's judicial grandstanding. In comments published by the Reuters news agency, a senior Chinese parliamentary official named Zhu Weiqun said Moreno's ruling was "absurd" and added: "If some country's court takes on this matter, it will bring itself enormous embarrassment. Go ahead if you dare."

The Madrid-based newspaper El País published a warning by Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei, who said: "We urge Spain to face up to China's solemn position, change the wrong decision, repair the severe damage, and refrain from sending wrong signals to the Tibetan independence forces and hurting China-Spain relations."

By going after China, however, Spain appears to have bitten off more than it can chew. Spain—where 5.9 million people (or 26% of the working population) are currently unemployed, and where the economy contracted by 1.3% in 2013—seems poorly placed to confront China, the world's second-largest economy.

According to El País Madrid fears Beijing will take economic reprisals against Spain, as it did against Norway after the Norwegian Nobel Committee in 2010 awarded the Nobel Peace Prize to Liu Xiaobo, a dissident serving an 11-year prison term in China. More than three years later, there are still no high-level exchanges between China and Norway.

China is Spain's biggest trading partner outside the European Union, with bilateral trade amounting to $27.6 billion in 2012. China is also the second largest foreign holder of Spanish debt, with about €80 billion ($110 billion), or 20% of the total. In addition, China is an important source of tourists for Spain. More than 175,000 Chinese tourists visited Spain in 2012, a 55% jump over 2011.

Not surprisingly, the government of Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy is seeking to avoid a full-blown crisis in relations with China.

In this context, Spanish lawmakers on January 17 submitted a bill that calls for changes to Spain's 1985 Organic Law of the Judiciary (Ley Orgánica del Poder Judicial) that would further restrict the application of universal jurisdiction.

In addition to the requirement (established in 2009) that Spanish judges can only pursue crimes of genocide or crimes against humanity when the case directly involves Spanish citizens, the new bill would further require that those individuals who are criminally responsible for the alleged human rights abuses must themselves be Spanish citizens or foreign nationals who obtained their Spanish citizenship before the crimes took place.

The bill also includes a provision that all universal jurisdiction cases pending at the time of the entry into force of the new law should be dismissed if they do not meet the new legal requirements. This would effectively nullify the lawsuit against the Chinese officials.

By reining in the freewheeling judges, Spanish lawmakers are seeking to avert a crisis in relations with China. But they also seem to be heeding the advice of Henry Kissinger, who once warned that "universal jurisdiction risks creating universal tyranny—that of judges."

Soeren Kern is a Senior Fellow at the New York-based Gatestone Institute. He is also Senior Fellow for European Politics at the Madrid-based Grupo de Estudios Estratégicos / Strategic Studies Group. Follow him on Facebook and Twitter.

Source: http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4149/spain-universal-jurisdiction

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

Clapper: Iran Ready for Nuclear Breakout

by Tom Wilson


In yesterday’s State of the Union address President Obama spoke stridently of how “American diplomacy … has halted the progress of Iran’s nuclear program—and rolled back parts of that program.” The president spoke with apparent pride of the “peaceful” efforts being taken to prevent Iran from gaining nuclear weapons. How then to explain the fact that less than twenty-four hours after that speech was given, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence was being informed that Iran essentially already has breakout capacity for building the bomb should it wish to do so?

While presenting the annual report on the worldwide threat assessment before the committee, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper spoke of Iran’s extensive progress in expanding its nuclear and military infrastructure, including further work on its heavy-water facility at Arak. Clapper stated that “these technical advancements strengthen our assessment that Iran has the scientific, technical, and industrial capacity to eventually produce nuclear weapons. This makes the central issue its political will to do so.” In a roundabout way, it would seem that we are being told that Iran is now ready and able to get the bomb, and all that remains to be seen is whether it is willing. With that comes the implication that this “political willingness” is the last thing that we might have any leverage over.


Under the current agreement, reached in Geneva last fall, Iran commits not to enrich uranium above five percent, rather than going to above twenty percent from which it is a quick and relatively simple process to reach the high weapons-grade materials needed for a bomb. The closest thing to good news that the annual report has on Iran is the claim that Iran would not be able to actually accomplish this final breakout without being detected. Cold comfort indeed, and not only for those countries within Iran’s immediate vicinity, but for all of us. For the annual report also stated that, in addition to its large stock of ballistic missiles, which have the capabilities for carrying a nuclear warhead, Iran’s space program gives it the ability to develop long-range intercontinental ballistic missiles.

What is perhaps most disheartening about this report is that because of the emphasis that it puts on the need to be able to monitor closely whether Iran is taking the final steps toward breakout, Clapper counsels that further sanctions would be counterproductive. In other words, the argument now seems to be that the U.S. must avoid imposing further sanctions, lest it disrupt the Iranians’ willingness to allow inspectors to monitor their ongoing and undismantled nuclear enrichment program. This sits in rather sharp contrast to the six United Nations Security Council resolutions calling for a total halt to Iran’s uranium enrichment.

These sentiments essentially echo the argument being pushed by Obama himself when he says that he would veto Congress should it vote for the implementation of further sanctions against Iran. Having apparently gone to great lengths to prevent Israel from carrying out a strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities, arguing that the military option threatened to jeopardize efforts on the negotiations and sanctions track, now we are told that sanctions too must be avoided because they threaten to jeopardize efforts on the monitoring track. In this way appeasement naturally necessitates more appeasement until the only thing that stands between Iran and genocidal weapons is Iran’s “political willingness,” or lack of it.

Even if we accept the assessment that places our last hope on our ability to closely monitor Iran’s nuclear activities, there remains the question of what would happen if inspectors discovered Iran to be in breach of any agreement. It would be too late to reassemble the sanctions in time for them to have any effect and by that point Iran’s nuclear network may have progressed beyond anything that could be destroyed by airstrikes. Furthermore, it is not inconceivable that our intelligence is flawed–it wouldn’t be the first time. If Iran has an unmonitored secret site where it is enriching to weapons-grade levels then all of Obama’s efforts to placate Iran by pulling apart the sanctions regime will have been in vain in any case.

It may, however, be worth noting that a poll by the Mellman group released yesterday revealed that 68 percent of American voters prefer the use of a military strike to the prospect of a nuclear Iran. They no doubt have made the commonsense assessment that leads one to conclude that if sanctions are not proving effective then a conventional military confrontation with Iran now, however unpleasant, is still preferable to a nuclear one later. It is sometimes hard to tell if the Obama administration has fully explored that same thought process.  


Tom Wilson

Source: http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2014/01/29/clapper-iran-ready-for-nuclear-breakout/

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

Hamas, Islamic Jihad Gunmen Now in West Bank

by Khaled Abu Toameh

If anything, the rally that saw Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Fatah join forces in a rare show of power means that Abbas's claim that he is fully in control of the situation in West Bank is baseless.

For the first time since 2007, Hamas and Islamic Jihad militiamen this week made a public appearance in the West Bank, raising fears that the two radical groups continue to maintain a military presence in areas controlled by Mahmoud Abbas's Palestinian Authority.

Palestinians were surprised to see Hamas and Islamic Jihad militiamen in broad daylight in an area controlled by the Palestinian Authority.

The masked militiamen made their rare appearance in the Jenin refugee camp during a rally to commemorate Islamic Jihad member Nafi Sa'di, killed by the Israel Defense Forces last December.

Gunman flank a speaker at the Jenin rally staged by Hamas and Islamic Jihad in January 2014.

The Palestinian Authority security forces, which are supposed to be in control of the refugee camp, did not intervene to stop or arrest the Hamas and Islamic Jihad gunmen, even as they fired into the air in honor of Sa'di.

Over the past few years, the US- and EU-backed Palestinian Authority [PA] security forces have been clamping down on Hamas and Islamic Jihad supporters in the West Bank. Hundreds of activists belonging to the two radical groups have been arrested as part of the crackdown.

But this time the PA decided not to take any action against the Hamas and Islamic Jihad gunmen despite the fact that their public appearance is seen as a challenge to Abbas's authority.

One reason for this decision may be attributed to the possibility that the PA is afraid to confront Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The PA is already under attack from many Palestinians for conducting security coordination with Israel.

Last week, Hamas renewed its appeal to the Palestinian Authority leadership to halt all forms for security coordination with Israel.

A statement published by Hamas urged Abbas to "immediately halt security coordination with the Zionist entity."

Mahmoud Zahar, a top Hamas leader in the Gaza Strip, said that Abbas "was committing a big sin by opting to negotiate with Israel and prevent Palestinian resistance. Abbas's survival depends on continued security coordination with the Zionist enemy. By preventing the resistance, Abbas is weakening himself politically because the resistance supports the political process."

By allowing Hamas and Islamic Jihad militiamen to participate in a public rally in the West Bank, Abbas may also be seeking to send a message of warning to Israel and the US. This is a message that says that Palestinians have not abandoned the option of armed struggle against Israel as a way of achieving their goals.

Abbas may also be seeking to get more financial aid for the Palestinian Authority from the Americans and Europeans. The message he is sending to the American and European donors is that they need to give him more money and weapons, otherwise Hamas and Islamic Jihad would grow stronger and perhaps seize control of the West Bank.

A third message that Abbas seeks to send is one that is directed toward Hamas and Islamic Jihad. By allowing gunmen from the two groups to make a public appearance in the West Bank, Abbas is probably trying to appease the two groups and pave the way for "national reconciliation and unity."

Even more surprising was the fact that Fatah gunmen loyal to Abbas took part in the rally at the Jenin camp alongside Hamas and Islamic Jihad.

The participation of Fatah gunmen in a Hamas and Islamic Jihad rally shows that the PA and Abbas continue to face a serious challenge from their own loyalists. Moreover, it shows that there is coordination between Abbas's Fatah gunmen and Hamas and Islamic Jihad militiamen in the West Bank.

As senior Hamas representative Wasfi Kabaha declared at the rally, "We wanted to send a message to Israel that the Palestinian resistance continues to exist in the West Bank and is prepared for confrontation. We also wanted to affirm the need for national unity."

If anything, the rally that saw Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Fatah join forces in a rare show of power means that Abbas's claim that he is fully in control of the situation in the West Bank is baseless.

Yasser Arafat allowed Hamas to operate freely in the Gaza Strip until Hamas drove the Palestinian Authority out of the area. Abbas is now committing the same mistake and could lose the West Bank to Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The question is whether this will happen before or after the establishment of a Palestinian state.


Khaled Abu Toameh

Source: http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4148/hamas-islamic-jihad-west-bank

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The International Holocaust Remembrance Day Charade

by Joseph Puder


 

President Barack Obama joined in the commemorations of the International Holocaust Remembrance Day (the day the Red Army liberated Auschwitz, January 27, 1945), issuing a statement that urged the nation and the world to remember the victims of the Holocaust.  His statement said “We recall six million Jews and millions of other innocent victims who were murdered in Nazi death camps. We mourn lives cut short and communities torn apart.” Obama added, “In our lives, we always have choices. In our time, this means choosing to confront bigotry and hatred in all its forms, especially anti-Semitism.” Obama’s statement talked about doing our part to ensure that survivors receive some measure of justice.

While President Obama’s words are praiseworthy, his recent actions in striking a deal with the Islamic Republic of Iran, which is dedicated to the destruction of the Jewish state, and pressuring Israel to make dangerous concessions to the Palestinians, is placing the Jewish state in jeopardy. The Obama administration must recognize the fact that to ensure survivors receive ‘some measure of justice’ means protecting the Jewish state, and the living Jews from another Holocaust. The anti-Semites of this world, whether in the halls of the U.N. or in Tehran, Ramallah, or Gaza, want nothing better than to annihilate the Jewish state. 

The State of Israel is the “collective Jew,” and home to the majority of Holocaust survivors. The charade that the U.N. puts on annually on January 27, called the International Holocaust Remembrance Day, cannot obscure its deliberate and vicious anti-Semitism practiced by the majority of this body, and its affiliated agencies, targeting exclusively the Jewish state. 

Addressing the U.N. delegates in January, 2005, on the commemoration of the 60^th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp, Israel’s foreign minister at the time, Sylvan Shalom reminded the delegates that the U.N. Charter meant to insure against another Holocaust. “The very first clauses of the UN Charter bear witness to the understanding of the founders, that this new international organization (The United Nations, JP) must serve as the world’s answer to evil (of the Nazi holocaust JP), that it comes, and I quote: ‘to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights and the dignity and worth of the human person.’ ”
The current Israeli ambassador to the U.N., Ron Prosor, had this to say on Monday, January 27, 2014. “The U.N. marks the International Holocaust Remembrance Day, but the hatred that is disseminated by (certain) governments only shows that the organization (the U.N., JP) has yet to internalize the lessons of the Holocaust.  Nearly 70 years since the end of World War II, we are still witnesses to the phenomena of racism and anti-Semitism that rears its head around the world.”  Prosor pointed out that anti-Semitism has not been eradicated, and its venom is being expressed in sermons by Palestinian Authority (PA) clerics, in PA educational institutions, textbooks, and in speeches by leaders around the world. He accused Gaza based Hamas of perpetuating anti-Jewish propaganda, and specified that “Palestinian children learn that the lives of Jews are worth less.”

On the eve of the International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the Israeli government received its annual report on anti-Semitism worldwide. It appears from the report that there has been a worrisome increase in anti-Semitism, according to 76% of the respondents. The report presented by Economy Minister Naftali Bennett, shows that the highest percentage of reported anti-Semitic activities are in Hungary, France, Belgium, and Sweden. The situation is less severe in Italy, Germany, and Britain. In Hungary, the respondents pointed to the extreme Right as the most threatening to Jews, whereas in France and Belgium, radical Muslims are the major source of anti-Semitic hate. 69 years after the liberation of Auschwitz, European Jews live once again in fear.

If aliens stumbled upon the U.N. debates, read its resolutions, or walked the U.N. halls, they would clearly conclude that the sole purpose of this world body is to censure a tiny Jewish state called Israel. The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), which is a non-voting observer to the U.N., is the second largest intergovernmental organization after the U.N, and can count on the votes of 57 Islamic states as its members. Along with the Third World member states, the OIC is almost guaranteed to master an “automatic majority.” Until the fall of the Soviet Union, that majority could add the Soviet Bloc, and in 1975, following a steady drumbeat of anti-Israel declarations, the U.N. General Assembly adopted the resolution that “Zionism is Racism.”  

This January, a few days before UNESCO was to launch a landmark exhibit at its Paris headquarters on The 3,500 Year Relationship of the Jewish People and the Land of Israel, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) reneged due to Arab League pressure.  UNESCO chief Irina Bokova shamefully surrendered to the Arab demands. Hillel Neuer of the U.N. Watch revealed that “if the notorious UN Human Rights Council dedicates a full 50% of its resolutions to demonizing the Jewish state, at UNESCO the numbers are 100%.”  Neuer added, “Despite the repeated claims by the Obama administration that UNESCO is God’s gift to the Jews, and to humanity, the opposite is true; it is arguably the most anti-Jewish body in the entire U.N.”

With remarkable cynicism, the same Ms. Bokova, UNESCO’s chief, who canceled The 3,500 Year Relationship of the Jewish People and the Land of Israel exhibit, attending the International Holocaust Remembrance Day at Paris Shoah Memorial stated, “The future cannot be built on a forgotten past. The history of the Jewish genocide is the history of the Jewish people and it is also the history of humanity as a whole.”

The Guardian piece by Alexander Ryvchin (November 26, 2013) exposes the anti-Israel bias in the U.N.  He wrote, “The need for greater balance in the U.N. treatment of the Arab-Israeli conflict recently came to light in the most unexpected of circumstances.  Earlier this month the U.N. General Assembly convened to engage in its annual ritual of passing a series of resolutions condemning Israel. Not a single resolution critical of the Palestinian leadership, or concerning any other global issue for that matter, was adopted during the meeting. The point of interest was the candid reaction of a Spanish-speaking U.N. interpreter, oblivious to the fact that her microphone remained on as she addressed her colleague.” The interpreter complained about 10 anti-Israel resolutions while there’s other really bad things happening around the world, but no one says anything about the other problems. Ryvchin concluded, “Through her frank admission, the interpreter, unencumbered by rank or protocol, was perhaps the only person in the room who had nothing to be embarrassed about. She had spoken an inconvenient truth, and the delegates in the chamber knew it.”

The inconvenient truth is that the U.N. is a major purveyor of anti-Semitism today.  Through its deliberate bias against the Jewish state it has also fostered anti-Jewish bigotry. The only Jews the U.N. undemocratic majority loves are dead Jews, hence the annual lip service to the Holocaust, and condemnation of anti-Semitism. Ambassador Prosor summed it up best when he said “The State of Israel is the only guarantee that the future fate of the Jewish people will be held in our own hands.”

As long as the cabals of undemocratic states hold sway at the U.N. and its affiliated institutions, and President Obama facilitates a stronger and more dangerous Iran, the International Holocaust Remembrance Day must be seen for what it is; lip service to murdered Jews and a charade.


Joseph Puder

Source: http://www.frontpagemag.com/2014/joseph-puder/the-international-holocaust-remembrance-day-charade/

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Politics and the Anti-Sanctions Coalition

by Tom Wilson


With news that support for Iran sanctions may now be showing signs of crumbling among Democrats in the Senate, it’s worth recalling that there have been a host of Jewish and self-titled liberal Zionist groups working tirelessly to make this happen. When UCLA Professor Mark Kleiman recently urged those who “have Jewish sounding names” to lobby their senators against further Iran sanctions, it was because he knew that these calls would seem to carry extra weight and legitimacy if they appeared to be coming from those who are assumed to be pro-Israel.

Several Washington-based lobby groups, claiming to be pro-Israel, have been lending their image of legitimacy to an organized coalition that is working to lobby against Iran sanctions. In joining this group, which also receives its briefings from White House officials, J Street and Americans for Peace Now are putting themselves into coalition with a number of other organizations and individuals who are at best completely indifferent to Israel’s welfare, such as, for instance, the National Iranian American Council.

That said, it is doubtful that these left-wing Jewish groups are being motivated by any explicitly pro-Iranian sentiment. Rather it seems that, in J Street’s case in particular, this action is an expression of shameless partisan loyalty to what is after all a Democrat administration and to the policies generated from the left of the Democratic Party. As recently as July of last year, J Street had been vocally supporting sanctions when the Obama administration was pushing this as an alternative to military action; now that the administration is also setting about dismantling the sanctions J Street has also fallen in line and is advocating precisely the same policy. American’s for Peace Now, hardly to their credit, have been a little more consistent in opposing sanctions against Iran. They even opposed sanctions when the administration thought them a preferable way to encourage Tehran to participate in negotiations over the Iranian nuclear program. 

The coalition was brought together by the Ploughshares Fund, which advocates for a nuclear free world (the irony). Those attempting to justify logically and morally untenable positions often feign sophistication by appealing to the counter-intuitive, yet the fact that this effort against sanctions–sanctions that are specifically designed to prevent a nuclear Iran–is being led by people claiming to be against nuclear weapons is simply beyond paradoxical. It was noteworthy at the time that many of those who campaigned against the war in Iraq, claiming they favored non-violent solutions, had previously protested sanctions against Iraq also. Now, with Iran, those who were against the military option are also lining up to try and prevent the sanctions option. Indeed, in an almost Orwellian inversion, some in this coalition have accused the supporters of sanctions of “warmongering.” The question arises, what kind of pressure for preventing the proliferation of the very nuclear weapons that these people claim to oppose would they consider acceptable?

In the case of both of the supposedly pro-Israel groups in question, their participation in this coalition would seem to suggest that whatever it is that they are committed to, it is hardly Israel’s welfare first and foremost. J Street already made clear that it took its marching orders from the Obama administration when it lobbied hard for Chuck Hagel’s nomination to be secretary of defense. Hagel had made a series of infamously anti-Israel and even anti-Jewish comments and had been concerningly ambiguous in his stance on Iran. J Street not only failed to oppose his nomination, they supported it.

American’s for Peace Now may be less slavish to the dictates of the Obama administration, but their consistent opposition to even peaceful measures for preventing Iran from getting the bomb would seem to betray a general hostility to Western interests as well as to the security and survival of Israel in particular. 

When American Jews and friends of Israel look to AIPAC, or the ZOA, or the Emergency Committee for Israel, they may not agree with all of their tactics or even their policies. Yet, they can be sure that these groups are unequivocally pro-Israel. Of J Street and American’s for Peace Now they know no such thing. 


Tom Wilson

Source: http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2014/01/30/politics-and-the-anti-sanctions-coalition/

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

Shimon Peres says that Jews can live safely in Palestinian state: “What’s this fear? They’ll kill Jews? Today?”

by Robert Spencer




Uh, yeah. They’ll kill Jews. Today. This could only have been said by someone who has no conception of the nature of the jihad ideology, and of the significance of the epigraph from Muslim Brotherhood founder Hasan al-Banna on the Hamas charter: “Israel will arise and will remain until Islam eliminates it.” The establishment of a Palestinian state with Jews living in it will mean the murder of the Jews living there, and further jihad attacks against Israel.

“Peres: ‘Live Under the PA, What Are You Afraid Of?,’” by Ari Yashar for Israel National News, January 29:

Amid the ongoing crisis between Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Economics Minister Naftali Bennett over the idea of leaving Jews under Palestinian Authority (PA) rule, President Shimon Peres decided to add his opinion to the debate.
Bennett wrote on his Facebook page Monday “why can’t we let the Palestinians be sovereign over Israelis? Because they’ll kill them.” He added a picture from the notorious lynch in 2000 of two Israeli police officers at the hands of a Palestinian Arab mob in Ramallah.
In response, Peres opined Wednesday morning at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) that Jews would be “safe” living under PA rule.
“What’s this fear that’s struck us suddenly? They’ll kill Jews? Today?” commented the doubtful Peres. “The fear should have been in 1948 when we didn’t have a cannon, tank or plane against seven armies.”
Despite Peres’s appraisal that having a cannon means no Jews will be killed, Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) figures note that terrorist attacks skyrocketed in 2013, jumping to 1,271 from 578 the year prior. Of those attacks, 1,042 took place in Judea and 229 took place in Samaria, the areas Peres claims can be abandoned safely.
Ironically, the same day that Peres opined “today they won’t kill Jews,” an Arab terrorist opened fire on an IDF guard post next to the Samaria community of Ateret, which lies near Ramallah. Soldiers returned fire, eliminating the terrorist.
Peres steadfastly supports the establishment of a Palestinian state in the heart of the country, even as the PA refuses to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.
“If we want to be a Jewish people we need a Jewish state, and all other reasoning has to bend to that need,” said Peres Tuesday.
In the past Peres has said the PA recognition of Israel as a Jewish state is “unnecessary.”
The president has also warned of “tragic consequences” if Israel does not submit to peace proposals that would require massive territorial withdrawals and a divided internationally-managed Jerusalem.
The president has a history of downplaying the lethal dangers posed by Israel’s terrorist threats.
In 2006, in the midst of massive Kassam rocket attacks on Sderot from Gaza, Peres claimed “[We] have to stop being hysterical about the Kassams. …What’s the big deal? …We have to tell the Palestinians that Kassams, Shmassams, we’re staying.”

Robert Spencer

Source: http://www.jihadwatch.org/2014/01/shimon-peres-says-that-jews-can-live-safely-in-palestinian-state-whats-this-fear-thats-struck-us-suddenly-theyll-kill-jews-today/

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Holder Fail: AG can't Explain why Obamacare Executive Orders are Constitutional

by Thomas Lifson


Yesterday was a bad, bad day for the Attorney General of the United States. Senator Mike Lee twice asked Eric Holder to explain the constitutional basis of President Obama's executive orders suspending parts of Obamacare, and the AG fumbled badly, essentially claiming the dog ate his homework. Joel Gehrke of the Washington Examiner:

Attorney General Eric Holder couldn't explain the constitutional basis for executive orders such as President Obama's delay of the employer mandate because he hasn't read the legal analysis -- or at least, hasn't seen it in a long time.
"I'll be honest with you, I have not seen -- I don't remember looking at or having seen the analysis in some time, so I'm not sure where along the spectrum that would come," Holder replied when Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, asked him to explain the nature of Obama's constitutional power to delay the mandate.
Lee had based his question on a standard legal test, first described by Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, who said the president's authority to issue executive orders is strongest when he does so with the backing of Congress (category one), more dubious when he issues an order pertaining to a topic on which Congress has not passed a law (category two), and weakest when the executive order is "incompatible with a congressional command" (category three), to use Lee's paraphrase.
Holder assured Lee that Obama's team accounts for Jackson's three-part analysis, but said he couldn't use that test to explain in any detail what kind of authority the president wielded when he delayed the employer mandate.

Here is the video:




John Hinderaker of Powerline comments:

This is a very serious matter. For a president to issue orders for which he has no constitutional authority is the gravest possible abuse of his office. And Holder's assurance that President Obama prefers to "work with Congress," and only issues executive orders when he can't get his way by "working with Congress," is itself outrageous. Congress has the power to enact legislation; the president does not. If Congress chooses not to enact a law that the president wants, that does not empower the president to legislate via executive order.

If Obama were not the first black president, and if the mainstream media were not in his camp, this would be impeachment fodder. But alas, equal justice for all is just a faint memory for the political establishment at this point in time. As Sen. Lee put it:

it is clear the president has "usurped an extraordinary amount of authority within the executive branch."
"This is not precedented," he concluded. "And I point to the unilateral delay, lawless delay in my opinion, of the employer mandate as an example of this. At a minimum, I think he owes us an explanation of what his legal analysis was."

Thomas Lifson

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2014/01/holder_fail_ag_cant_explain_why_obamacare_executive_orders_are_constitutional.html

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

Israeli Defense Official Offers Dark Security Assessment

by IPT News


Israel is entering an "Era of Fire" in which it is threatened by 170,000 rockets and missiles and in which the Syrian civil war has placed "30,000 global jihad terrorists" at its doorstep, Israel's defense intelligence chief said in a speech Wednesday.

"Israel is surrounded by 360 degrees of actual enemies," said Major General Aviv Kohavi at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS).

Most of those foes have enough internal strife to make any imminent attack unlikely, he said. But if circumstances change, they have the means to threaten Israel more dramatically than ever, and both terrorist groups and governments continue to diversify their arsenals. "The line between a terror organization and a military organization continues to blur."

The fight to topple dictator Bashar al-Assad has been a magnet for jihadis from throughout the world. At some point, they will leave that fight and pose new threats to Europe, North Africa and America. Many will seek to stay in the area, finding camps in Lebanon and Sinai.

"We are talking about extremists clinging to extremist ideologies - anti-Western and anti-Modern ideologies. We are talking about exceptional cruelty and brutality close to our borders," Kohavi said.

Israel is developing medium-range missile defense systems, but the volume and sophistication of rockets controlled by Hizballah in Lebanon means not every rocket can be intercepted. "For the first time the enemy now has the ability to hit Israeli cities hard," Kohavi said.

The Muslim Brotherhood's ouster from power in Egypt and corresponding pressure on Hamas "is a serious opportunity" for Israel, he said. But new threats, such as Iran's nuclear weapons program nearing completion and an increase in cyber-attacks, add to the challenges facing Israeli defense and intelligence officials.

"Cyber​​warfare, in my humble opinion, will soon emerge as a more important discovery than gunpowder," Kohavi said.


IPT News

Source: http://www.investigativeproject.org/4279/israeli-defense-official-offers-dark-security

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

All the President’s Women

by Nonie Darwish


 

It is not a coincidence that most of the Obama administration scandals happened under the leadership of women. The Obama administration chooses to surround itself with “yes men” and “yes women,” but liberal “yes women” have an advantage: it is hard to criticize and grill them when a scandal happens without being accused of sexism and being a bigoted woman-hater.

In our current political environment, liberal politicians in general, men and women, get away with a lot more than conservative politicians because of media liberal bias. But liberal female politicians can get away with a lot more than their male counterparts, and that explains why almost all the Obama scandals have female faces behind them. Under ordinary conditions, men or women should end up becoming fall guys or gals, but many of the women behind the Obama scandals end up rewarded, sometimes even with a better position.

The Benghazi scandal supposedly hurt several women: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Ambassador Susan Rice and Charlene Lamb, among others. It is clear that the White House, for an unknown reason, manipulated the State Department’s decision-making process regarding Benghazi and Clinton went along. Hillary, who wants to be president, has recently stated that she regrets Benghazi, but her “regret” would be more accurately described as her “failure” to be her own boss in the State Department.

When the Benghazi scandal exploded, the administration had to quickly find a “yes” liberal woman to take Hillary’s place on TV. Susan Rice thus came to the rescue when Hillary refused to face the music in public. The White House and the media did everything they could to shield Hillary from the scandal — even from her own investigators, the State Department Accountability Review Board. The Review Board issued their report without interviewing the boss, Hillary, but they accused yet another woman, Ms. Lamb, for failure in leadership when her office denied providing extra security to the US Ambassador in Libya. But low and behold, Ms. Lamb, who was accused of dropping the ball, was never fired and instead was rewarded by the same State Department that gave her another key position.

Few men can, with a straight face, expect to get away with yelling back to questions in Congress, “What difference does it make?” Only a liberal woman with an entitlement mentality can get away with something like that without becoming the laughing stock of Saturday Night Live. Nothing works better to manipulate public opinion more than an offended woman questioned by a nasty, bigoted Republican male.

The Affordable Care Act scandal also had many women behind it and could never have passed Congress without Nancy Pelosi who, like Hillary, feels entitled to immunity from criticism. Pelosi bragged she would stop at nothing to pass the bill when she said:

We’ll go through the gate. If the gate’s closed, we’ll go over the fence. If the fence is too high, we’ll pole vault in. If that doesn’t work, we’ll parachute in but we’re going to get health care reform passed for the America people.

No man could have gotten away without scrutiny for a statement like: “We have to pass the [health care] bill so that you can find out what’s in it.” Only in the current liberal environment can the media make a self-made woman like Sarah Palin the subject of ridicule material, while taking someone like Pelosi seriously.

After Pelosi passed the healthcare bill, another woman took over its implementation: Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius. While only a few have read or comprehended Obamacare, Sebelius happily took over the job and consistently expressed confidence that everything was under control. She never prepared America for a possible disaster until the opening day of October 1st when the disaster exploded.

Women, who don’t like to be questioned, were also the face of the IRS Scandal. Before taking the 5^th, Louis Lerner gave herself the right to state she had done nothing wrong. Lerner’s boss at the IRS, Sarah Ingram, was director of the office that oversaw tax-exempt organizations during the targeting of conservative groups. But again, instead of a demotion, she was promoted to lead the Obamacare office.

While Democrats accuse Republicans of a “War on Women,” they have no problem in using liberal a woman as a shield from scandal. These women act untouchable and entitled and are guarded by a liberal media who will viciously attack Republicans whose job is supposed to be the loyal opposition. But how can you be an effective opposition if your opponent claims gender discrimination every time you question all these liberal women leaders?

Even if these women are exposed to scandal, they act like they have been wronged, deserve to be rewarded, insist on staying the course, claim the 5^th and even get promoted. When Hillary Clinton put up with and defended her husband’s accusations of sexual harassment on the job, she managed to appear as the victim who deserved to be elected Senator, Secretary of State and perhaps the Democratic nominee for President. You see, we owe her.

The mainstream media and academia have produced generations of American women with a constant chip on their shoulder, with unrealistic expectations who perceive life’s challenges as a personal attack because they are women. Ironically, these are the same women who ignore Islamic scandals of honor killing, female genital mutilation and killing of apostates. Some of them even go as far as accusing critics of Islam of being “Islamophobes.”

Some liberal women’s feelings of entitlement end up driving them to exaggerate and lie about their background to get special treatment. Two examples are Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and State Senator Wendy Davis of Texas. One can only imagine what kind of work environment these women will create around them.

The current leftist political culture surrounding women is setting them up either to fail or to turn them into female dictators in an authoritarian mommy state that will threaten the fabric of our free society. Under the guise of “we are pro-women” the Left is using women as tools to silence criticism and inquiry of scandals. While the mainstream media places liberal women on a pedestal, it hammers, ridicules and uses vile insults on air to describe conservative women.

And we let them get away with it.


Nonie Darwish is author of “The Devil We Don’t Know.”

Source: http://www.frontpagemag.com/2014/nonie-darwish/all-the-presidents-women/

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