NIF-supporting Reform Jewry boycotts Israel's Tourism Minister - Ronn Torossian

by Ronn Torossian

America's Reform Jews are extremists, Israel's Minister of Tourism is not.

American Jewish media recently reported that Reform Jews are refusing to meet with Israeli Tourism Minister Yariv Levin, after Levin told it like its and called Reform Judaism a “dying world” that has succumbed to assimilation. Levin, a secular Jew, said all Reform Jews would disappear in two or three generations. The fact is that their numbers get lower every year.

Rabbi Rick Jacobs, president of the American Union for Reform Judaism responded on Israel Army Radio that, “As long as he (Levin) doesn’t think that Diaspora Jews have a right to voice opinions on matters such as the [Western Wall], there’s no reason to give him a platform in Jewish communities and organizations in the United States, and added Minister Levin will not teach us what support for Israel is.”  He urged Reform Jews to boycott Levin, forgetting that originally, Reform Jewry removed all mention of a return to Israel from its prayerbooks and was anti-Zionist.

It’s unfortunate that during this mini dust-up American Jewish media missed the fact that so many Reform Jewish leaders openly support a boycott of Israel and not just of Minister Levin.  Take Rabbi Jacobs himself - a member of the Rabbinic Cabinet of J Street – and also a long-time board member of the extremist New Israel Fund, which openly supports a boycott of Israel, as well as the labeling of Israeli products from Judea & Samaria.

Jacobs opposed sanctions on Iran, and urged President Barack Obama not to veto a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning as “illegal” Jewish homes and communities in Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem.  Jacobs has demonstrated with the Sheikh Jarrah Solidarity Movement, which urges an end to Israel “occupation” and the liquidation or fundamental change of organizations that contribute to the “dispossession of Arabs,” including the Jewish Agency, the Jewish National Fund and the Israel Lands Authority.  Jacobs is an extremist whose positions are far to the left of the Labor Party, and well out of the mainstream.
Rabbi Aaron Panken, President of Hebrew Union College the largest training school in the world for Reform Judaism is on the NIF International Council. On March 3, 2016, Temple Sinai of Oaklandwill host a speech by the President of the New Israel Fund in their congregation.

Is this the face of Reform Judaism in America? Supporting a boycott of Israel?

The New Israel Fund gives financial support to groups that encourage boycotts of Israel.The NIF also funds attempts to blacken the name of and demean the IDF and discourage young Israelis from serving in the armed forces through such NGOs as Breaking the Silence, B’Tselem, and others. It funds media bias intended to isolate Israel through the likes of +972 Magazine. NIF grantee Hamoked is an NGO that funds lawsuits supporting the families of terrorists. 

The New Israel Fund harms Israel – and the leaders of Reform Judaism must stop boycotting Israel. The extremists aren’t those who sit in the democratically elected government in Israel. They are those who masquerade as American Jewish leaders supporting Israel and fund a boycott of Israel – including Alisa Doctoroff, President of UJA-Federation, the Jim Joseph Foundation, Rabbi Gordon Tucker of Temple Israel of White Plains and others.


Ronn Torossian

Source: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/18403#.VsHxEuazdds

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

New bill seeks to block boycotts of Israeli goods in UK - Shlomo Cesana, Erez Linn and Israel Hayom Staff

by Shlomo Cesana, Erez Linn and Israel Hayom Staff

Legislation would make excluding Israeli products a criminal offense for public bodies, student unions • Boycotting Israeli goods "is potentially damaging to the U.K.'s relationship with Israel and risked fueling anti-Semitism," says minister.

Wine produced in Judea and Samaria on display at a supermarket in Jerusalem [Archive] | Photo credit: AP

New British government directives are aiming to prevent public bodies, universities and student unions from boycotting Israeli products, The Independent reported Sunday. According to The Sunday Times, the move "follows mounting concern among Jewish leaders about anti-Semitism."

British media quoted Cabinet Office Minister Matthew Hancock, who is scheduled to visit Israel later this week, as saying such boycotts are divisive, potentially damaging to the U.K.'s relationship with Israel, and risk fueling anti-Semitism. 

The new bill, already described as a "controversial crackdown," seeks to prevent any public body from imposing a boycott on a World Trade Organization member, which Israel has been since 1995. The regulation will essentially outlaw boycotting Israeli products -- a threat often made against goods produced in Judea and Samaria -- and allow the British government to take legal action against organizations that impose such boycotts.

Under the plan, all publicly funded institutions would be barred from excluding goods produced by their idea of "unethical companies," such as companies involved in arms trading, fossil fuels, tobacco products, or companies based in Judea and Samaria.

Any public bodies that continue to pursue boycotts would face severe penalties, The Independent reported.

Critics of the initiative said it constituted a "gross attack on democratic freedoms."

Hancock said the current situation, which gives public bodies autonomy to make ethical purchasing decisions, was "undermining" Britain’s national security. 

"We need to challenge and prevent these divisive town-hall boycotts," Hancock told the International Business Times. "The new guidance on procurement, combined with changes we are making to how pension pots can be invested, will help prevent damaging and counter-productive local foreign policies undermining our national security. ... We will take steps to stop such outdated policies being pursued through procurement and pension policies. We will safeguard the security of families at home and prevent such playground politics undermining our international security." 

MP Eric Pickles, head of Conservative Friends of Israel in Britain, said, "This move is very welcome. The attempt by the irresponsible Left to demonize Israel is bad for British business, bad for the local taxpayer, and deeply damaging to community relations. It encourages anti-Semitism and strives to make a municipal foreign policy contrary to the interests of the U.K."

Hugh Lanning, head of the U.K.-based Palestine Solidarity Campaign, condemned the move as "a gross attack on our democratic freedoms and the independence of public bodies from government interference."

Shlomo Cesana, Erez Linn and Israel Hayom Staff

Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=31771

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

Obama Invites Enemy Spies to U.S. Military Brainstorming Sessions - Humberto Fontova

by Humberto Fontova

One catastrophic intelligence flap after the next.

This very week General James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence, testified that Castro’s spies remain a serious security threat to the U.S.:

“The threat from foreign intelligence entities…is persistent, complex, and evolving. Targeting and collection of US political, military, economic, and technical information by foreign intelligence services continues unabated. Russia and China pose the greatest threat, followed by Iran and Cuba…” (General James Clapper, Washington D.C. Feb 9, 2016.)

But two weeks ago (Jan. 26-29th) when the U.S. military’s Southern Command held its annual “Caribbean regional security conference,” senior members of Castro’s KGB-trained spy agency were kindly invited to participate.

“Aw come on, Humberto,” you say!  “All nations embed spies in their diplomatic corps, for crying out loud. Let’s give Obama’s people a break on this one. How are they supposed to know which Cubans are the spies? It’s a jungle out there, amigo!”

Good point. Very true. In fact, U.S. intelligence services, regardless of the president they served, do not have an exactly stellar record with regards to Castro. To wit:

“We’ve infiltrated Castro’s guerrilla group in the Sierra Mountains. The Castro brothers and Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara have no affiliations with any Communists whatsoever.” (In Nov. 1958 Havana CIA station Chief Jim Noel, was reacting to warnings from “tacky right-wing Mc Carthyite!” Cubans.)

“Nothing but refugee rumors. Nothing in Cuba presents a threat to the United States. There’s no likelihood that the Soviets or Cubans would try and install an offensive capability (nuclear missile) in Cuba.”  (JFK’s National Security Advisor Mc George Bundy on ABC’s Issues and Answers, October 14, 1962. The sneering former Harvard Dean was reacting to warnings from “tacky right-wing McCarthyite!” Cuban-exiles.)

In fact, in 1987 Cuban Intelligence Officer Florentino Aspillaga defected in Prague and revealed that every single Cuban agent (4 dozen of them) the CIA had recruited to spy on the Castro regime since 1962 was in fact a double-agent controlled personally by Fidel Castro.

While not renowned for its sense of humor, the Castro regime had fun with this one. In the Havana museum known as “ Hall of Glory to Cuba’s Security Services” sits a Rolex pulsar watch personally dedicated by U.S. Sec. of State (of the time) Henry Kissinger to CIA “Agent Zafiro.”  With his dedication the U.S. Sec. of State, (Harvard A.B., summa cum laude 1950, M.A. 1952, PhD 1954) was thanking KGB-trained Cuban Nicolas Sirgado (“Agent Zafiro”) for his ten years of loyal and invaluable services to the U.S.

OK, stop laughing and let’s get back to the subject at hand: The recent Obama intelligence flap is different. You see, the Castro regime apparatchik invited to participate in last week’s security conference was sniffed out by the FBI and Defense Intelligence Agency as a communist spy back in 2002—and booted from the U.S. amidst considerable media fanfare. Some background:

In 2002, KGB-trained Cuban spy Gustavo Machin worked in the “Cuban Interest Section” (embassy) in Washington D.C. He was expelled from the U.S. in relation to the most damaging penetration of the U.S. Department of Defense in recent history. The Cuban spy convicted of the penetration and damage is named Ana Belen Montes, known as “Castro’s Queen Jewel” in the intelligence community.  She was convicted of the same crimes as Ethel and Julius Rosenberg and today she serves a 25-year sentence in Federal prison.

The FBI and Defense Intelligence Agency believed Gustavo Machin to be her accomplice in stealing U.S. military secrets for sale to the highest bidders among America’s enemies worldwide. As your humble and hard-working servant here tried (vainly!) to explain on Fox News, a few months ago, the Castro-Family-Crime-and-Terror-Sponsoring-Syndicate (euphemized as Cuba by the media) serves as “intelligence trafficker to the world.”

Alas. Rodney Dangerfield would have gotten more respect than I did.

Interestingly (and mostly ignored by the major media, as usual) just days after the 9-11 terror attack, Castro’s intelligence mounted a major deception operation attempting to trip-up our investigation into the terrorist culprits. Most of you ever heard about it from the mainstream media. So here:

“In the six months after the 9/11 attacks,” ran the Miami Herald investigative report, “up to 20 Cubans walked into U.S. embassies around the world and offered information on terrorism threats. Eventually, all were deemed to be Cuban intelligence agents and collaborators, purveying fabricated information. Two Cuba experts said spies sent by Cuba to the United States were part of a permanent intelligence program to mislead, misinform and identify U.S. spies” (emphasis added).

"Cuba is intelligence trafficker to the world," stresses Lieut. Col. Chris Simmons, recently retired from the Defense Intelligence Agency. “Among many others, the U.S. military secrets stolen by Castro’s spies have been sold to former regimes in Iraq, Panama and Grenada, alerting these dictatorships to U.S. military plans against them and costing untold American lives.”

The only thing that saved “Castro’s Queen Jewel” Ana Belen Montes from frying in the electric chair like the Rosenbergs was a plea bargain. The only thing that saved her accomplice Gustavo Machin from the same frying was his “diplomatic immunity.” Furthermore:

In 2001 members of a Castro spy ring known as the “Wasp Network,” were convicted in U.S. federal court. Some were sentenced to as much as two life sentences for conspiracy to commit murder. The FBI affidavit against them included:

*Gathering intelligence against the headquarters of the U.S. Southern Command in Homestead, Fla.

* Compiling the names, home addresses and medical files of the U.S. Southern Command’s top officers.

And it was the U.S. military’s Southern Command that just ( Jan. 26-29th)  held the “Caribbean regional security conference” to which KGB-trained senior Cuban spy Gustavo Machin was kindly invited to participate as leader of a delegation of numerous other KGB-trained Cuban spies.
 
You can’t possibly make this sh*t up!

Humberto Fontova

Source: http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/261819/obama-invites-enemy-spies-us-military-humberto-fontova

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

War hero: The death of Avidgor Ben Gal - Jonathan F. Keiler

by Jonathan F. Keiler

Ben Gal arguably saved the Jewish state from destruction, and both established and proved the tactical and operational concepts for defending the West against mass Soviet-style tank assaults.

Very few Americans have ever heard of Avigdor "Yanush" Ben Gal, who died yesterday in Israel at age 79.  But Ben Gal is an important figure in 20th-century history, who directly contributed to the end of the Cold War and fall of the Soviet Union, albeit in an indirect way. 

Ben Gal was an officer in the Israel Defense Force (IDF) Armored Corps.  Like many Israelis of his generation, he got to Israel in a roundabout way.  As a boy, he fled Poland as a refugee with his parents into the Soviet Union at the start of World War II.  His parents died along the way, but with his sister Ben Gal made it to the Palestine Mandate.  He served in the IDF in the 1956 Suez Campaign, the Six-Day War of 1967 (in which he was badly wounded), and the War of Attrition that followed.  He won his place in military history a few years later, during the 1973 Yom Kippur War.  Then, as commander of the IDF's crack 7th Armored Brigade, he arguably saved the Jewish state from destruction, and both established and proved the tactical and operational concepts for defending the West against mass Soviet-style tank assaults. 

At about 2 p.m. on October 6, 1973, Syria and Egypt launched a coordinated surprise assault on Israel.  IDF forces faced overwhelming odds on both fronts, but Israel had some breathing room in Sinai against Egypt.  Not so on the Golan Heights, where Ben Gal deployed with his brigade.  There only a few scant kilometers separated the front line from Israel proper.  The Syrians threw 30,000 troops and 1,500 tanks (supported by as many artillery pieces) at the Israeli line.  That line was thinly held by the under-strength 188th Barak Armored Brigade in the southern Golan and by Ben Gal's brigade to the north.  Between the two units, the Israelis deployed 177 tanks, about 50 artillery pieces, and fewer than 3,000 infantrymen. 

In three days of bloody fighting (in which the Barak Brigade was effectively wiped out, with both its commander and deputy commander killed in action), Ben Gal held the front together with surviving elements of the 188th and his own brigade.  In this action, Ben Gal's tanks savaged the Syrian assault, destroying 600-800 tanks (plus hundreds of other armored vehicles).  Ultimately, the 7th Armored stopped the Syrian attack cold, though at the conclusion of the fight, fewer than a dozen IDF tanks were still runners, the rest destroyed, damaged, or broken down.   A day after the defensive fight concluded, the surviving tanks of the 7th Armored, along with reserves, counter-attacked into Syria. 

The consequences of this battle to American armored doctrine are hard to overstate.  Ben Gal's defense of the Golan became a template for NATO forces in Europe.  Under General Donn A. Starry (who largely developed the American concept of air/land battle), the Yom Kippur War was (with respect to IDF successes and failures) was a prime model.  When I served with the 11th ACR in Fulda, Germany (1985-89), almost every armored officer could cite chapter and verse of the Golan fight.  Tom White, one of the regiment's commanders during my time there (who later became secretary of the Army), had a bookshelf lined with several volumes recounting the Yom Kippur battles.  Had the Soviets attacked at Fulda or elsewhere in Germany, they would have met American tankers, who, largely using Israeli techniques and tactics, would have savaged them as completely as the IDF did the Syrians – something Soviet generals well knew.

When those same American units eventually went into action a few years later in Iraq, they completely trounced the Iraqis.  But it is also worth noting that in 1973, Israeli troops driving World War II-era Sherman tanks also trounced the Iraqis (in brand new Soviet T-62s) at a later point in the battle. 

So intense and savage was the Golan fighting that when I visited the Golan battlefields in 1977 as a teenage kibbutz volunteer, the ground was still strewn with shrapnel, spent shell casings, and the burned out wrecks of fighting vehicles.  Ben Gal fought one of the greatest and most significant tank battles in history, and his place there is well and truly earned.

Jonathan F. Keiler

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2016/02/war_hero_the_death_of_avidgor_ben_gal.html

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

Russian PM Threatens Third World War - MEMRI

by MEMRI

In recent days, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev and Russian media outlets warned that, if Turkey and/or Arab states send ground troops into Syria, the conflict may escalate into a regional war or even a new world war.

In a February 11, 2016 interview with the German paper Handelsblatt, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev warned that if Arab countries sent ground forces into Syria, this could spark a new world war.[1] According to an English report about the interview published on February 12, he said that “all ground operations, as a rule, lead to permanent wars," and added: "The Americans must consider – both the U.S. president and our Arab partners – whether or not they want a permanent war... We must make everyone sit down at the negotiating table… rather than start yet another world war.”[2]

 
Image: Government.ru, February 11, 2016

The Russian RBC news agency reported that, at the February 13, 2016 Munich Security Conference, Medvedev stated that the world has slid into a new cold war, when it actually needs cooperation, not confrontation and a "third world shake-up."[3]

The Russian daily Komsomolskaya Pravda quoted military expert Mikhail Timoshenko as saying that, if Turkey and Saudi Arabia invaded Syria, "it would not be an easy situation for the Russian aviation group." He explained:  "It's one thing to bomb terrorist groups, [but] Moscow could hardly target American or British troops, or the Turkish or Saudi armies. That would effectively mean a third world war." Timoshenko expressed hope that "the U.S. will prevent Turkey from invading, because [U.S.] President Obama hardly wants to be remembered as the leader who started World War III."[4]

In an article on the Russian online paper Gazeta.ru, journalist Igor Kryuchkov quoted Dmitry Danilov, head of the European Security Department at the Europe Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, as saying: "If, under the pressure of [Syrian] government troops, Syrian rebels move from the Aleppo area towards the Turkish border, this will require quick decisions from Turkey. First, what to do about the rebels. Support them with [Turkish] army forces? [Second,] if an invasion [is in order, should it be] carried out with Saudi Arabia and other Arab states?..." Kryuchkov concluded that "Turkey has to find the answers to these questions very soon. The situation in the Aleppo area can provoke Turkey to nervous action that can turn the Syrian crisis from a local conflict into a regional war."[5]

---

[1] Handelsblatt.com, February 11, 2016.

[2] Global.handelsblatt.com, February 12, 2016. It should be mentioned that, according to a Russian transcript of the interview published on the Russian government's official website, Medvedev did not speak of "another world war", but only warned about starting "another war in the world." Government.ru, February 11, 2016.  

[3] Rbc.ru, February 13, 2016.

[4] Kp.ru/daily, February 12, 2016.

[5] Gazeta.ru , February 9, 2016.

MEMRI

Source: http://www.memri.org

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

Why are Arabs on a killing spree? Watch this cartoon - Gil Ronen

by Gil Ronen

Cartoon uploaded to social media is a prime example of the incitement machine that exhorts Arabs to attack.

An animated video making the rounds on social media in recent days provides a prime example of the sophisticated incitement machine that has been fueling the current terror war against Israeli Jews.

It exhorts Arabs to get up from whatever they are doing, step into their cars, grab a knife or gun, and go kill Jewish soldiers wherever they may be found.

The video exhibits high-quality professional animation, which probably cost thousands of dollars to produce.
A pro-Hamas video that was uploaded to the Internet last week featured a singing troupe, an Egged bus and an enactment of a suicide bomber's mission.



As translated by Palestinian Media Watch, the song is rife with delicate gems of poetry such as this:

"Oh bearer of good tidings, wrap the explosive belt around your waist. The story of the Intifada will only be told when the roof of a bus goes flying.

"Oh Martyrdom-seeker, make them cry. Make the fire engulf them. Turn them into body parts, roast them, bringing joy to the hearts of the steadfast people.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s office vowed in January, for the umpteenth time, to fight incitement by Palestinian Authority (PA) officials and media against Israel.

Israeli officials have warned that this incitement is the root cause for the current wave of terrorism against Israelis.


Gil Ronen

Source: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/208055#.VsHwCeazdds

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

Australia’s Labor Party going anti-Israel in quest for Muslim votes - Thomas Lifson

by Thomas Lifson

Leading Aussie syndicated columnist: "Labor, desperate for Muslim votes in Western Sydney, is openly pandering to bigots and anti Semites

Like Western Europe, Canada, and the United States, Australia has been on the receiving end of a growing stream of Muslim immigrants, to the great advantage of the domestic political leftist parties.  The Australian Labor Party, which is currently the opposition to the centrist Liberal/National coalition that has formed the government, has long favored Muslim immigration.

Now that Muslims located in Sydney’s western suburbs form a significant voting bloc, the ALP is going hard against Israel.  Andrew Bolt, syndicated columnist based at the Melbourne Herald-Sun is denouncing this in no uncertain terms:

Labor, desperate for Muslim votes in Western Sydney, is openly pandering to bigots and anti Semites:

NSW Labor delegates to this weekend’s state conference have proposed ... 18 policy agenda items relating to Indigenous affairs and 24 about the environment. But there are a staggering 28 motions regarding Israel, most of them critical, out of the entire 45 foreign policy items up for discussion.

Shame on them. Shame. (snip)
If Labor passes such motions, any Jew who backs the party is a collaborator to Jew-hatred.

He documents the foreign policy obsession of the party:

Number of times Israel is mentioned: 104
Number of times China is mentioned: 6
Number of times Russia is mentioned: 1
Number of times terrorism is mentioned: 1
Number of times jihad is mentioned: 1 (naming Labor candidate Jihad Dib.)
Number of times economy is mentioned: 45
Number of times jobs is mentioned: 63
And number of times climate change is mentioned: 34 (which at least suggests even Labor is getting bored)

Hat tip: John McMahon

Thomas Lifson

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2016/02/australias_labor_party_going_antiisrael_in_quest_for_muslim_votes.html

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

Bill to expel pro-terror Arab MKs drafted - David Rosenberg

by David Rosenberg

Final touches completed on bill which would allow the Knesset to expel members for support of terrorism, racist incitement.

Zoabi after questioning (file)

Flash 90

 

On Monday the Knesset’s Constitution, Law, and Justice Committee completed drafting a proposed bill that would allow for the expulsion of Knesset Members found to be supporting terrorism, Walla News reported.

If adopted, the bill would permit the Knesset to expel members found to have expressed support for terrorism. Expulsion would require the support of 90 MKs out of a total of 120.  

Members could also face removal for incitement to racism or a rejection of Israel as a Jewish democratic state.  

The draft was drawn up at the behest of committee chairman and Jewish Home MK Nissan Slomiansky, and would replace the current law which permits expulsion only in the case of actions in support of terrorism, not expressions of support for terror.

The new bill was proposed after three Arab MKs from the Joint List visited with the families of Arab terrorists, praying and holding a minute of silence for the terrorists, and promising to get the return of their bodies. 


David Rosenberg

Source: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/208077#.VsIuGOazdds

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

Egypt's "Security Threat": Churches - Raymond Ibrahim

by Raymond Ibrahim

• Whenever Christians attempt to repair, renovate, or build a church -- all of which contradict Islamic law -- the same chain of events follows. Local Muslims riot and rampage, and local (Muslim) officials conclude that the only way to prevent "angry youths" from acts of violence is to ban the church, which is then declared a "threat" to security.
• Repeatedly, Christian leaders accuse local officials of inciting Muslim violence against churches. Muslim leaders then point to this violence to deny the church a permit on the grounds that it has attracted violence.

On February 1, Tharwat Bukhit, a Coptic Christian member of Egypt's parliament, announced "there are approximately 50 churches in Egypt closed for reasons of security."

When the "Arab Spring" broke out in 2011, Egypt's Christians compiled a list of 43 churches that had been shut down by local authorities over the years. This list was given to the prime minister of Egypt at the time, Dr. Essam Sharaf, who said that the churches would be opened as soon as possible. Yet since then, according to Bukhit, "Today, the number of closed churches has grown to almost 50."

Why are Christian churches being "closed for reasons of security"? Whenever Christians attempt to repair, renovate, or build a church -- all of which contradict Islamic law[1] -- the same chain of events follows. Local Muslims riot and rampage, and local (Muslim) officials conclude that the only way to prevent "angry youths" from acts of violence is to ban the church, which is then declared a "threat" to security.

Such events have occurred repeatedly throughout Egypt. For instance, Abdel Fattah Sisi, Egypt's president, agreed to build a memorial church in the village of Al-Our, which was home to 13 of the 21 Christians beheaded in February 2015 by the Islamic State in Libya. The families of the victims still live there. After Islamic prayers on Friday, April 3, 2015, Muslim mobs from Al-Our village violently protested Sisi's decision. They yelled that they would never allow a church to be built. They chanted, "Egypt is Islamic!" and then attacked a Coptic church with Molotov cocktails and stones. Cars were set on fire, including one belonging to the family of a Christian beheaded by the Islamic State. Several people were seriously hurt.

In Sohag City, a similar chain of events took place. After waiting 44 years, the Christians of Nag Shenouda were issued the necessary permits to build a church. According to a 2015 report, local Muslims rioted and burned down the temporary worship tent. When a Christian tried to hold a religious service in his home, a Muslim mob attacked it. Denied a place to worship, the Christians of Nag Shenouda celebrated Easter 2015 in the street.

The Christians of Nag Shenouda, Egypt celebrated Easter 2015 in the street after local Muslims rioted and burned down their temporary worship tent, and attacked their religious service at a home.

In a separate incident, also after waiting years, the Christians of Gala' village finally received formal approval to begin restoring their dilapidated church (see pictures here). Soon after, on April 4, 2015, Muslims rioted, hurling stones at Christian homes, businesses and persons. Christian-owned wheat farms were destroyed and their potato crops uprooted. The usual Islamic slogans were shouted: "Islamic! Islamic!" and "There is no God but Allah!"

In July 2015, Muslims suspended prayer in a church in the village of Arab Asnabt. They called for the church to be demolished as part of an effort "to prevent Coptic Christians from practicing their religious rites."

Repeatedly, Christian leaders accuse local officials of inciting Muslim violence against churches. Muslim leaders then point to this violence to deny the church a permit on the grounds that it has attracted violence.

More recently, a church under construction in the village of Swada was attacked by a mob of at least 400 Muslims, possibly incited by local officials. After the attack, the church was closed by the same officials who had previously granted the necessary permits required for its construction. The 3,000 Coptic Christians in Swada, who make up approximately 35% of the population, do not have even one Coptic Orthodox Church to serve them.

This year, on February 1, the same day as Coptic Christian MP Tharwat Bukhit said nearly 50 churches had been shut down, the priest of St. Rewis Church described how, on the first day Christians met to worship in a fellow Christian's home that he had transformed into a church, "Muslims prevented them so that the church was closed on the very day it was opened."

On February 2, Father Lucas Helmi, an official of the Franciscan Order in Egypt, explained how "the closure of St. George's Church in the village of Hijazah in Qous [shuttered 25 years earlier] goes back to tensions between Coptic and Muslim families in the village, especially the Muslim neighbors around the old church, which is still unfinished because they refused to allow it to be rebuilt after it was demolished."

During a 25-minute interview on Arabic satellite TV, Bishop Agathon revealed[2] how, after an official council meeting with government leaders on the possibility of building a church, one of the authorities contacted the Islamic sheikhs of the village. The official asked the sheikhs if they stood "with the Coptic church or with the State?"

The sheikhs apparently told the Muslim households to each send one family member to protest the building of the church. Security officials could then point to the "rioting mob" and, as usual, on grounds of security, ban the church.

Raymond Ibrahim, author of Crucified Again: Exposing Islam's New War in Christians (a Gatestone Publication, published by Regnery, April 2013), is a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and Judith Friedman Rosen Writing Fellow at the Middle East Forum

---

[1] According to the Conditions of Omar, a Medieval Muslim text that delineates the debilitations Christians must accept in order not to be killed by an Islamic state, Christians are commanded "Not to build a church in our city—nor a monastery, convent, or monk's cell in the surrounding areas—and not to repair those that fall in ruins or are in Muslim quarters; Not to clang our cymbals except lightly and from the innermost recesses of our churches; Not to display a cross on them [churches], nor raise our voices during prayer or readings in our churches anywhere near Muslims..." See Crucified Again, pgs. 24-30
[2] In his May 2015 interview, Bishop Agathon made many remarks accusing the Egyptian government of being behind the persecution of Christians in Egypt—including the rampant kidnapping of Christian children. 
A translation of his remarks can be read here.

• Follow Raymond Ibrahim on Twitter and Facebook

Raymond Ibrahim, author of Crucified Again: Exposing Islam's New War in Christians (a Gatestone Publication, published by Regnery, April 2013), is a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and Judith Friedman Rosen Writing Fellow at the Middle East Forum

Source:  http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/7433/egypt-churches

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

Saudi Singer on Egyptian TV Criticizes Radical Islam - Larry Elder

by Larry Elder

Shams Bandar asks a bold question.

This fight against radical Islam is also a fight within Islam. Where, we constantly ask, are the voices of "moderation" who question the barbarity committed in the name of Islam?

Consider Shams Bandar.

Born in Saudi Arabia, this popular singer renounced her Saudi citizenship, lives in Europe and intends to become a citizen of a European country. On an Egyptian channel called Dream TV, Bandar said to the astonished host, "We have been fighting and shedding blood for 1,400 years, and now we are blaming America and Britain?"

Provided by the Middle East Media Research Institute, here is a translated transcript of the exchange:

Host: "Are you trying to sell the notion that foreign citizenship is the paradise that will save you from the hell of the Arab world?"

Shams Bandar: "Do you want me to be a hypocrite or not?"

Host: "I want the truth. Is it paradise?"

Bandar: "Of course. At this time —"

Host: "People will accuse you of treason, of collaboration, and the selling out of the Arab cause."

Bandar: "I have been accused of that for a long time now. It's nothing new. Foreign citizenship. ... It's not that I'm happy with the way things are, but let's not deceive ourselves. Why tell ourselves lies? The Syrians are scattered in the world's oceans, dying by the millions on a daily basis. ... Iraqis are dying by the millions. ... All the Arab countries have closed their borders to them. What can these wretched people do with their Arab citizenship? How does a suffering Syrian benefit from his Arab citizenship, when his children and family have been killed and his life has been destroyed? His own Arab brethren do not let him in. What if he were a British citizen? Wouldn't the British embassy send a ship to get their citizens out? Why are we lying? Why aren't we telling the truth? I'm not forcing people to get foreign citizenship."

Host: "But it is these countries that caused the catastrophes of the (Arab) peoples. I wouldn't portray these countries as lifesavers."

Bandar: "They are not lifesavers.

But in Britain or America ... note that I am against the policies of their governments. I always say so. But show me where it says in their constitutions that you can chop people's hands off, stone people, execute them in the streets, or do all the things done by ISIS and the Islamist movements, which are harmful to Islam. Do you see in the American constitution and law any of the things perpetrated by our Muslims? Can we say that they do these things in the West, too? Why would they, when their constitutions are all about the respect for humanity? Let's not get into what they do in secret, because I have no proof of that."

Host: "What about their barbaric, bloody, aggressive conduct?"

Bandar: "I see no evidence of that. All I see is laws, legislation, and constitution. Can anyone convince me that in America or Europe, they do what ISIS is doing to the Syrians, to the Yazidis, or to the Iraqis? Why do we pin all our problems on the West? For 1,400 years we have been slaughtering one another, just because one of us prays one way and another prays a different way. America wasn't around 1,400 years ago. It wasn't around even 300 years ago. We have been fighting and shedding blood for 1,400 years, and now we are blaming America and Britain?!"

After the Charlie Hebdo attack in Paris, Renald "Luz" Luzier, one of its principal Muhammad-drawing cartoonists, announced his intention to stop drawing the prophet, saying it "no longer interested" him. "I've got tired of it," he said, "just as I got tired of drawing (former French president Nicolas) Sarkozy. I'm not going to spend my life drawing them." Was it lack of interest — or fear?

It is therefore all the more remarkable when we hear loud and brave voices like Pakistan's Malala Yousafzai, the schoolgirl shot in the head by the Taliban because she stood up for the right of girls to be educated. Yousafzai survived, won the Nobel Peace Prize and continues to speak out for the rights of Islamic women.

We pray for the safety of courageous truth-telling warriors like Yousafzai and Bandar.

Larry Elder

Source: http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/261812/saudi-singer-egyptian-tv-criticizes-radical-islam-larry-elder

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