WarSclerotic

A World Without the United States
By By Justin T. Palm Via The Real Truth

(The question is not so much who would fill the void but who COULD fill the void. While I have more faith in the US and its return to greatness, I found this Evangelical perspective interesting.-LS)

America’s influence on all nations has been unprecedented, and its disappearance would cause dramatic changes across the globe.

Imagine a world with no United States. No cheeseburgers. No ice-cream sundaes. No McDonald’s. No Ferris wheels. No iPhones or iPads. No Hollywood, pop music, or blue jeans.

These small contributions are nothing compared to the influence the nation has had on a global scale.

“For almost three centuries, the world has been undergirded by the presence of a large liberal hegemon—first Britain, then the United States,” news commentator Fareed Zakaria wrote in his book The Post-American World. “These two superpowers helped create and maintain an open world economy, protecting trade routes and sea lanes, acting as lenders of last resort, holding the reserve currency, investing abroad, and keeping their own markets open. They also tipped the military balance against the great aggressors of their ages, from Napoleon’s France, to Germany, to the Soviet Union.”

He adds, “…the United States has been the creator and sustainer of the current order of open trade and democratic government—an order that has been benign and beneficial for the vast majority of humankind.”

Expand Image Source: Thinkstock

While America has been a global leader and sustainer of the free world during the past century, many believe the nation’s role as lone superpower is coming to an end.

Examining current trends reveals a United States in decline. It is experiencing a weakening in its foreign influence, an overextension of its military, and the worst economic downturn in decades, including a sharp devaluation of its currency.

In its place, countries such as China, India and Brazil are emerging, as are Russia, South Africa, and Kenya, among others.

According to Mr. Zakaria, such power shifts are inevitable: “There have been three tectonic power shifts over the last five hundred years…The first was the rise of the Western world, a process that began in the fifteenth century and accelerated dramatically in the late eighteenth century…The second shift, which took place in the closing years of the nineteenth century, was the rise of the United States. Soon after it industrialized, the United States became the most powerful nation since imperial Rome, and the only one that was stronger than any likely combination of other nations. For most of the last century, the United States has dominated global economics, politics, science, and culture. For the last twenty years, that dominance has been unrivaled, a phenomenon unprecedented in modern history.

“We are now living through the third great power shift of the modern era. It could be called ‘the rise of the rest.’ Over the past few decades, countries all over the world have been experiencing rates of economic growth that were once unthinkable.”

Those who want to see America “back on top” believe a world led by the waning superpower will be better off in the long run. They consider representative democracy the best form of government, and capitalism more effective than other economic systems.

This begs the question: what impact has America had on the world—and what effect would its disappearance have on civilization?

Unparalleled Influence

Author Robert Kagan, who describes the current world order as the “American world order,” wrote about the subject in his book The World America Made.

“The most important features of today’s world—the great spread of democracy, the prosperity, the prolonged great-power peace—have depended directly and indirectly on power and influence exercised by the United States.”

Of course, this is not to say the nation is perfect. It has made mistakes. Obviously, since the beginning of time, every country has.

In terms of benevolence, however, few countries in history have exercised the generosity and desire to protect the freedoms of others as has the U.S. Relative peace among the most powerful nations has largely been maintained for decades.

Economically, America’s impact on the world has also been unprecedented. Through manufacturing, aid programs, exports, free trade, and more, America has shared its prosperity like no nation before it. For instance, after World War II, the United States enacted the Marshall Plan, sending billions of dollars in aid to rebuild Europe and East Asia.

“For four centuries prior to 1950, global gross domestic product (GDP) rose by less than 1 percent a year,” Mr. Kagan writes. “Since 1950 it has risen by an average of 4 percent a year, and billions of people have been lifted out of poverty.”

He states later in the book, “During the period of American hegemony, the global economy produced the greatest and most prolonged era of prosperity in history. Between 1950 and 2000, annual GDP growth for the entire world was 3.9 percent, as compared with 1.6 percent between 1820 and 1950 and an estimated 0.3 percent between 1500 and 1820. This increasing prosperity was also much more widely distributed around the world than in the past.”

Language has been another export from America (and Britain) that has dramatically influenced the world. Notice this from a statement by the British Council: “English has official or special status in at least seventy five countries with a total population of over two billion…one out of four of the world’s population speak English to some level of competence; demand from the other three-quarters is increasing.”

Besides wealth and language, democracy has been another major export of the United States. While also far from perfect, this system has generally promoted peace and freedom wherever it has been instituted.

Mr. Kagan wrote that since the birth of the nation in the late 1700s until the close of the 1800s, no more than five countries around the world could ever have been considered democratic. With America’s growing influence on global politics, this number increased to around 20 to 30 by 1950. At the time, this was about 40 percent of the global population. Incredibly, looking at the time period from the late 1970s until the early 1990s, more than half the world’s population was living under a democratic government, with 120 democracies around the world.

Maintaining Peace

Another way America has exercised its influence on the world is through peacekeeping. The second world war thrust the United States into a prominent place on the world stage, and forced it to take a stand as a “global sheriff.”

Since the close of World War II, a third world war has so far been averted largely because of America’s efforts. Think of the closest thing to it—the Cold War between the U.S. and Russia. Nothing happened. Large numbers were not killed. No mass troop transports took place. Allies of either nation were not dragged into a long, violent conflict. No peace treaties needed to be signed, no land re-staked due to battles. A disastrous worldwide war was avoided.

The previous 60 years of relative peace on a worldwide scale has had almost everything to do with the role America has played as world policeman.

“The power of the United States has been the biggest factor in the preservation of great-power peace,” Mr. Kagan writes.

“Contrary to what one often hears, multipolar systems have historically been neither particularly stable nor particularly peaceful. War among the great powers was a common, if not constant, occurrence in the long periods of multipolarity in the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries, the latter culminating in the series of destructive Europe-wide wars following the French Revolution and ending with Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo in 1815…”

“The great powers today act in a restrained fashion not because they are inherently restrained but because their ambitions are checked by a still-dominant United States.”

Although sometimes begrudgingly, U.S. military power and foreign policy has acted as the glue that has kept the current world order from splintering into chaos. American might has kept other countries with a history of aggression in check, specifically Russia and China.

Throughout the millennia of man’s existence, the “American era” could be viewed as a golden era for peace and abundance around the world. A single nation has never brought so much prosperity and freedom to all.

Promise Made Long Ago

Historians clearly recognize what happened regarding the United States’ ascension to such great heights, but cannot provide a full explanation of why. Credit is given to capitalism or the character and work ethic of the American people. Others believe it is the nation’s form of government or its Constitution that brought it greatness.

Yet the full story of America’s meteoric rise to international dominance lies in its origin and the peoples from which it descended.

Long ago, a promise was made to the ancient patriarch Abraham. Due to faithful obedience, God stated He would bless him and his descendants: “Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get you out of your country…unto a land that I will show you: and I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great; and you shall be a blessing: and I will bless them that bless you, and curse him that curses you: and in you shall all families of the earth be blessed” (Gen. 12:1-3).

Notice how this promise was passed on to Abraham’s son Isaac: “And the Lord appeared unto him [Isaac], and said…I will be with you, and will bless you; for unto you, and unto your seed, I will give all these countries, and I will perform the oath which I swore unto Abraham your father; and I will make your seed to multiply as the stars of heaven, and will give unto your seed all these countries; and in your seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because that Abraham obeyed My voice…” (Gen. 26:2-5).

Jacob, Isaac’s son, also qualified to inherit the promises made to Abraham: “And God appeared unto Jacob…and blessed him. And God said unto him…your name shall not be called any more Jacob, but Israel shall be your name…I am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall be of you, and kings shall come out of your loins; and the land which I gave Abraham and Isaac, to you I will give it, and to your seed after you will I give the land” (Gen. 35:9-12).

This promise had two aspects—one regarding rulership, a dynasty, and the other a birthright, consisting of physical blessings. After being passed to Jacob, the birthright was conferred on his son, Joseph (read I Chronicles 5:2) and his two children, Ephraim and Manasseh. When fully understood, this promise originally made to Abraham was fulfilled in the descendants of Ephraim—Great Britain—and Manasseh—the United States. (For more about these prophecies, along with historical facts and proof, read David C. Pack’s book America and Britain in Prophecy.)

Return to Mr. Zakaria’s quote: “These two superpowers [America and Great Britain] helped create and maintain an open world economy, protecting trade routes and sea lanes, acting as lenders of last resort, holding the reserve currency, investing abroad, and keeping their own markets open. They also tipped the military balance against the great aggressors of their ages, from Napoleon’s France, to Germany, to the Soviet Union.”

Just one example of this is the dominance America has exercised over the world’s sea gates. In 1948, United States Navy Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz wrote, “Sir Walter Raleigh declared in the early 17th century that ‘whoever commands the sea, commands the trade; whosoever commands the trade of the world commands the riches of the world, and consequently the world itself’…The United States possesses today control of the sea more absolute than was possessed by the British. Our interest in this control is not riches and power as such. It is first the assurance of our national security, and, second, the creation and perpetuation of that balance and stability among nations which will insure to each the right of self-determination…Our present control of the sea is so absolute that it is sometimes taken for granted” (The Navy Department Library).

Unknown to almost all, God is the Source of America’s unprecedented wealth, influence and power. The soaring prosperity America has been given was due to one man’s faith centuries ago—not American exceptionalism, chance, fate, hard work, or capitalism. It was God who lifted America above other nations, making it great. This is the little understood truth of why America rose to greater heights than any other nation in the history of the world.

Yet this same God also foretold what would occur if America did not obey Him with the faithfulness Abraham exhibited.

Prophesied Decline

Leviticus 26 reveals the blessings God would pour out on His people if they obeyed His commands: “If you walk in My statutes, and keep My commandments, and do them; then I will give you rain in due season, and the land shall yield her increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit. And your threshing shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time: and you shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land safely. And I will give peace in the land, and you shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid: and I will rid evil beasts out of the land, neither shall the sword go through your land. And you shall chase your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword” (vs. 3-7). This passage so obviously came to pass in America and Britain during the fulfillment of the promises to Abraham.

Due to widespread national disobedience, however, God is now removing these blessings from America. The latter part of Leviticus 26 (along with Deuteronomy 28:15-68) outlines the consequences of disobedience to God.

Since the nation has rejected its Creator, and not recognized Him as the Source of its abundance, the United States is in decline. This is not due to the natural course of events all great nations or empires experience. It is God’s doing, and it is inevitable. It can only be stopped through national repentance, which history and prophecy show is unlikely. (To learn how individuals can escape what is coming, read Promised Protection – Secret Rapture or Place of Safety?)

This descent has been underway for some time. For instance, militarily, America has not decisively won a war since World War II.

God warned Israel He would “break the pride of your power” (Lev. 26:19) if they disobeyed Him.

In Mr. Kagan’s book, he confirms America’s diminishing will to use force: “When the United States had 1 million troops deployed overseas in 1953, the total American population was only 160 million. Today, when there are half a million troops deployed overseas, the American population is 313 million. The country is twice as large, with half as many troops deployed as fifty years ago.”

American forces across the world are becoming overextended and exhausted. A Washington Times article “Troops Stressed to Breaking Point” reported, “…an exhaustive study of nearly 500,000 soldiers, reservists and veterans…notes that as many as 236,000 suffered from PTSD [post-traumatic stress disorder] since the beginning of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

“For military analysts, the reason is the nightmarish experience of sustained combat: Soldiers have been fighting the longest war in U.S. history, with frequent stressful deployments and compressed rest time back home.”

Economically, America has become a debtor instead of a lender. It has become service oriented instead of production-and-manufacturing oriented. Mr. Kagan writes, “America’s share of the world’s GDP, nearly 50 percent after World War II, fell to roughly 25 percent by the early 1970s, where it has remained ever since.”

Filling the Void

Clearly, the decline of the United States is fast becoming a simple fact of history. Ask: if America were to slip into obscurity, what would the world look like?

The United States has long been a country that has prided itself on its “free press” and “free speech.” If it were to disappear, different forms of “freedom” would take its place.

Notice just one example of China’s approach to the Internet: “Two Chinese political websites said…they had been ordered by authorities to shut for a month for criticising state leaders, the latest move in a broad government crackdown on the Internet…China launched a sweeping Internet crackdown…highlighting official unease ahead of a leadership transition later this year…China, which has the world’s largest online population with over half a billion users, has long blocked content it deems politically sensitive as part of a vast censorship system known as the Great Firewall” (Agence France-Presse).

Mr. Kagan provides a more sobering example: “The fact that China is trying to use its growing naval power not to open but to close international waters offers a glimpse into a future where the U.S. Navy is no longer dominant.”

Next, a world without America would lead to a huge increase in global poverty. Recall from earlier, “…in you shall all families of the earth be blessed” (Gen. 12:3), and “…in your seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed” (26:4).

America has typically given the largest amounts of foreign aid. This has been a way through which it has been able to act as a type of blessing to other nations. The disappearance of America would mean that already struggling nations would be on their own. The seemingly unending reservoir of Western funds distributed around the globe would dry up.

A world without America would also be a dangerous one for democracies. Think of the common slogan used to describe the role of the United States, “Making the World Safe for Democracy.” No U.S. means there would be no great power reinforcing, sustaining and protecting democratic governments across the world. Non-democratic, totalitarian forms of government would fill the power vacuum.

A report by The Economist titled “Democracy Index 2011 – Democracy Under Stress” shows this transition has already begun: “Global backsliding in democracy has been evident for some time and strengthened in the wake of the 2008-09 global economic crisis. Between 2006 and 2008 there was stagnation; between 2008 and 2010 there was regression across the world. In 2011 the decline was concentrated in Europe…There has been a decline in democracy across the world in recent years. The decades-long global trend in democratisation has come to a halt in what [has been] called a ‘democratic recession’.

“The dominant pattern globally over the past five years has been backsliding on previously attained progress in democratisation.”

Finally, and most important, return to the idea of America acting as a world policeman. What becomes of a city with no police? Thieves, murderers and criminals freely roam neighborhoods. Lawlessness abounds, and the consequences for wrongdoing disappear.

A world without America holding back aggressive nations is the same. Rogue regimes can act with impunity. In fact, with the United States military severely overcommitted, other nations have already been pushing the limits. Communist North Korea recently announced plans to test-fire a long-range missile. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad routinely rails against America and Israel in front of the United Nations General Assembly, all while evidence indicates his country is developing nuclear weapons. Washington’s solution? Economic sanctions.

A United States exit from the world scene could increase the likelihood that nations will attack each other. Its dwindling influence in foreign relations and diminished power of deterrence—which has prevented offensive attacks by the threat or power of retaliation—could eventually lead to World War III. Order could quickly be replaced by chaos, as occurred in the past when there was a shift in the balance of power.

As Mr. Kagan describes it, “We may discover then that the United States was essential to keeping the present world order together and that the alternative to American power was not peace and harmony but chaos and catastrophe—which is what existed before the American world order came into being.”

Bible prophecy reveals that all of the above conditions are coming. Both history and God’s Word prove that another nation—or company of nations—will fill the void left by America.

David Cameron outlines new anti-terror measures to MPs, BBC News, September 1, 2014

(Here’s a You Tube video of PM Cameron’s address to the British Parliament.

Will it be enough and legal or too little and illegal? — DM)

New powers are needed to seize terrorist suspects’ passports and stop British-born extremists from returning to the UK, David Cameron has said.

It was “abhorrent” British citizens had “declared their allegiance” to groups like Islamic State, he told MPs.

He said the inability to stop UK terrorists returning home from overseas was “a gap in the armoury” but only pledged cross-party talks on the issue.

Powers to monitor suspects in the UK will also be strengthened.

In a statement to Parliament, Mr Cameron restated the UK’s backing for US airstrikes against Islamic State militants in Iraq and said he would not rule out participation in similar action in the future.

The UK’s terror threat level was raised to “severe” from “substantial” on Friday.

‘Forensic focus’

The prime minister told MPs that developments in the Middle East over recent months had major implications for the UK’s security, with 500 British nationals estimated to have travelled to Iraq and Syria to fight on behalf of Islamic State and other militant groups.

He said the whole world had been “sickened and shocked” by the killing of US journalist James Foley and other atrocities in Iraq.

While rejecting calls for “sweeping and blanket” new laws in response, he said a “forensic focus” was needed to prevent people from travelling abroad in the first place and to deal with British jihadists returning to the UK from conflict zones.

Among measures announced:

• Legislation will be drawn up to give the police statutory powers to confiscate the passports of suspect terrorists at UK borders
• The UK will challenge any attempt by the courts to water down these powers
• Plans to block suspected British terrorists from returning to the UK will be drawn up on a “cross-party basis”
• Terrorism prevention and investigation measures (Tpims) will be extended, to include the power to relocate suspects
• Terrorists will be required to undergo de-radicalisation programmes
• Airlines will be forced to hand over more information about passengers travelling to and from conflict zones.

The home secretary already has executive powers to seize the passports of those travelling abroad in certain cases but Mr Cameron said the police needed greater discretion to act where needed.

“We will introduce specific and targeted legislation… providing the police with a temporary power to seize a passport at the border during which time they will be able to investigate the individual concerned,” he said.

Mr Cameron said the UK was able to block foreign nationals and those with dual citizenship from re-entering the UK but did not have the same power for UK nationals deemed to pose a threat to the country.

Under his proposals, UK nationals suspected of being involved in terror acts would be allowed to keep their British citizenship, but they would be prevented from re-entering the UK for a period of time.

He added: “Adhering to British values is not an option or a choice. It is a duty for all those who live in these islands so we will stand up for our values, we will in the end defeat this extremism and we will secure our way of life for generations to come.”

Labour leader Ed Miliband said the opposition would offer broad support to the government in its core objectives of keeping the UK safe but said there was a lack of detail and Mr Cameron had been wrong to abolish the system of control orders – which banned suspects from certain areas – in 2011.

“Relocation was indeed a central part of control orders and it was a mistake to get rid of them in the first place,” he said.

Mr Miliband said a “mandatory and comprehensive programme of de-radicalisation” was needed “not just for those who will be under Tpims but those who have been on the fringes of extremism in Iraq and Syria”.

Deputy Prime Minister and Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg told the BBC the coalition was “absolutely not repeating the mistakes of the last Labour government, which introduced very faulty control orders that kept being challenged by the courts”.

It was instead a way to “disrupt the contacts” extremists had “with other people who we think are of real concern”.

Amid talk of Lib Dem opposition to some of the proposals, former leader Sir Menzies Campbell said the package was “more nuanced” than anticipated but warned that rendering citizens stateless was regarded as illegal in international law.

While many Tory MPs backed the measures, former Attorney General Dominic Grieve warned plans to bar UK nationals from returning home risked “flouting principles of international law and of English common law” and called for prosecutions in the UK where possible.

It is already a criminal offence to travel abroad to commit or prepare a terrorist offence or to travel for the purpose of terrorist training, with suspects able to be prosecuted in the UK.

Clive Coleman, BBC Legal Affairs Correspondent

There is a real and important difference between removing a person’s citizenship and removing their passport.

If a British citizen who holds sole British nationality – ie does not have dual citizenship – has his or her British citizenship removed, that would render the person stateless, and that is contrary to both international and domestic law. Under current law, the home secretary is prevented from removing citizenship if to do so would render a citizen stateless.

So, in practice, the power can only be used against those with dual citizenship. The government wants to change the law. This could mean that citizenship can be removed from those with sole British nationality. However, we will have to wait and see precisely what the government announces in its package of measures today.

If a person with sole British nationality is or has been acting in a way that is “not conducive to the public good”, for instance by involving themselves in terrorism, then they can have their passport removed. That can be a temporary measure and does not remove their citizenship.

BBC political editor Nick Robinson said the UK was looking at working with Germany, Turkey and other countries through which suspected British jihadists travelled to and from the Middle East to alert them to their presence so they could be detained and questioned before setting foot on UK soil.

IS militants have seized swathes of territory in Syria and Iraq and have been condemned for the mass slaughter of religious minorities in the region, including Iraqi Christians and the Yazidi community.

The UK is assisting Iraqi and Kurdish forces fighting Islamic State as well as providing humanitarian aid to those displaced by the fighting.

On Sunday, the RAF delivered 11 tonnes of equipment directly to the northern city of Irbil, including ammunition supplied by other nations and body armour helmets provided by the UK.

Mr Cameron also covered the situation in Ukraine, and the weekend’s EU summit.

Our world: Embracing the obvious truth.

By CAROLINE B. GLICK

26/08/2014 21:59

The moral and ideological divide between Israel and Hamas is so self-evident that the only way to ignore it is by embracing and cultivating ignorance.

It isn’t hard to understand the truth about Israel and Hamas.

Four-year-old Daniel Tragerman was murdered on Friday afternoon in his home in Kibbutz Nahal Oz by Hamas terrorists.

They shot him with a mortar launched from a school in Gaza’s Zeitoun neighborhood. At the time of the launch, the school was filled with civilians who had fled to the school for shelter.

They fled to the school for shelter because they were forced to vacate their homes.

They were forced to vacate their homes because Hamas terrorists were launching mortars and rockets at Israeli civilian sites, like Daniel Tragerman’s home, from their apartment buildings.

The moral and ideological divide between Israel and Hamas is so self-evident that the only way to ignore it is by embracing and cultivating ignorance.

This week Richard Behar published an in-depth investigative report in Forbes documenting how the US media is doing just that. As Behar demonstrated, the media is collaborating with Hamas in its war against Israel.

Behar cited example after example of how the US media, led by The New York Times have systematically ignored, obfuscated and downplayed Hamas’s war crimes while swallowing whole its bogus statistics and accusations against Israel.

The greatest threat to faux reporters like the New York Times Israel bureau chief Jodi Rudoren and her colleagues are people who refuse to accept their distortions and insist that the truth be told.

The most dangerous of the truth tellers are the non- Jews who stand up for Israel.

This week, former British Labour MP Denis MacShane published an op-ed in Haaretz where he spoke to this point. MacShane argued that for Israel to win the information war being waged against it must cultivate non-Jewish defenders.

In his words, “The British media… is awash with defenders of Hamas and Palestinian resistance. Hardly any are Muslims. In contrast, the prominent journalists – Jonathan Freedland, Daniel Finkelstein, Melanie Phillips, David Aaronovich – who support Israel are, well, Jews.”

MacShane argued that because they are Jews, readers dismiss them.

They “shrug their shoulders and think privately: ‘They would say that, wouldn’t they.”

Israel has an enormous reserve of support among non-Jews. But due to the mainstream media’s commitment to dishonesty and deliberate cultivation of public ignorance and moral blindness in their coverage of Israel, for many, the price of defending Israel is becoming prohibitive.

Israel’s enemies in the West do their best to reinforce this perception.

Consider the case of Jon Voight.

The celebrated Oscar-winning actor is an outspoken champion of Israel. Earlier this month, Voight published an open letter to Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem in Variety where he harshly criticized the Spanish performers for their public statement condemning Israel and siding with Hamas in its war against the Jewish state.

In his words, “I am heartsick that people like Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem could incite anti-Semitism all over the world and are oblivious to the damage they have caused.”

Voight was viciously attacked for speaking out.

Last week, two UCLA professors, Mark LeVine and Gil Hochberg, co-authored an article published in The Huffington Post assaulting him for his views and his temerity to suggest that Israel is a moral, embattled democracy fighting genocidal forces committed to its destruction.

The two Jewish academics are supporters of the anti-Israel boycott, divestment and sanctions movement.

The principal aim of the BDS movement is to make it socially unacceptable to support Israel. In 2010 LeVine and Hochberg signed a petition calling for California state universities to divest from companies that do business with Israel.

Online Hollywood commentators, such as Deadline’s Nellie Andreeva, opined that Voight, who was nominated for an Emmy Award for his role in Showtime’s Ray Donovan series, was liable to lose his Emmy bid due to his support for Israel.

Hochberg and LeVine’s assault on Voight was a long-winded voyage into the post-Zionist and anti-Zionist literary moonscape. Their principal criticism of Voight was that he refuses to accept this intellectual wasteland’s rejection of the known facts of history.

Voight is not an academic, nor has he ever claimed to be an expert on Middle Eastern history. He is a non-Jewish American concerned about the future of America.

That is why he stands with Israel. Voight recognizes that when Israel is under assault, and its right to defend itself is denied while terrorists are supported, the US is endangered. And so he feels compelled to speak out, regardless of the price.

In his response to the threats to deny him the Emmy due to his support for Israel Voight told USA Today, “I’m not speaking to get awards. I’m speaking because I’m concerned about my grandchildren and the life they’re going to live, and the country they’re coming in to. I want to protect them.”

Another non-Jewish champion of Israel is former US senator and Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum. Both during his tenure in the Senate and since, Santorum has spoken out strongly against Iran’s nuclear program, insisting that it is a serious threat not only to Israel, but to the US itself.

Like Voight, Santorum recognizes that the fate of the US is directly tied to the fate of Israel.

For his trenchant support for Israel, and his outspoken concern about Iran’s nuclear program, as well as his support for domestic issues where he has not shied away from taking controversial, inconvenient position, Santorum’s critics have demonized him.

But undaunted, he continues to speak out.

Last week, Santorum led a solidarity mission to Israel. The majority of his colleagues were non-Jewish opinion shapers from Iowa, the first state to hold Republican presidential contests. Santorum explained that his goal in coming to Israel was not simply to show Israelis that the American people support us. It was to build support among Republicans in Iowa for a robust US engagement in foreign affairs based on supporting Israel, fighting America’s enemies and preventing the forces of hatred, like Hamas and Iran, from expanding their power.

Santorum’s chief concern is that weary of foreign policy failures, more and more Republicans are embracing the isolationism most identified with Senator Rand Paul. Paul is currently polling well in Iowa.

Over the weekend Paul referred to Hillary Clinton as “a war hawk,” and said, “I think the American public is coming more and more to where I am.”

Santorum is convinced that if Iowans are educated about the nature of the threats emanating from the region, and of Israel’s singular contribution to the cause of freedom and stability, their position can become the basis for a Republican foreign policy that rejects isolationism and embraces US leadership in world affairs as the only way to secure the US and strengthen its embattled allies.

In other words, like Voight, Santorum’s support for Israel is rooted in his concern about America, and its future. Like Voight, Santorum recognizes that the growing penchant among elite opinion shapers to ignore truth in the pursuit of moral relativism and fake sophistication or isolationism constitutes a danger to America.

This week the New York Times descended to yet another low, reporting as fact totally unsubstantiated accusations by the son of a senior Hamas terrorist that Israel tortured him and used him as a human shield during a brief incarceration.

But it appears that the jig may be winding down.

More and more people are following the lead of men like Voight and Santorum, and insisting that the truth be told.

This week more than 190 Hollywood luminaries followed Voight’s courageous lead and signed a public statement condemning Hamas.

Quin Hillyer, a reporter for National Review who accompanied Santorum on his mission, wrote Monday, “My visit to Israel last week confirmed that Iran and its fellow jihadists have good reason to see Israel and the United States in the same light. Israelis and Americans share the same humane, Western values…

“Israel is an oasis in a desert – in the physical, topographical sense but also metaphorically. It’s an oasis of reason, human decency and justice appropriately grounded in mercy.”

MacShane is right. It is vital for more non-Jews, who refuse to deny the truth that screams out to be told, to stand up to the lies and publicly stand with Israel. It is the job of Israel and Jewish communities throughout the world to empower them by among other things, reducing the power of Israel’s enemies to make them pay a price for their decency.

The writer is the author of The Israeli Solution: A One- State Plan for Peace in the Middle East.

Ban Ki-moon’s Israel-condemnation addiction, Israel Hayom, Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, September 1, 2014

(Unfortunately but not unexpectedly, Ban Ki-moon’s ailment is endemic in the “international community.” Perhaps it is because Israel tries to be and is excessively conciliatory. The Islamic State and other Islamic jihad entities are conciliatory only toward those who support and otherwise encourage them. — DM)

The Middle East is on fire, its flames threatening the continuity of civilization itself. Around the world people looked aghast at the revolting beheading of American journalist James Foley by terrorists of the Islamic State (ISIS). It was followed by the public execution of 18 Palestinians, including two women, by Hamas on charges of collaboration. Executed, without trial, in cold blood.

These acts of barbarism are only the latest examples of the monstrous enemy, radical Islam.

In Iraq and Syria, ISIS is now beheading children and crucifying youths in their genocidal war against Christians, Yazidis, and whomever else is standing in the way of their caliphate.

In Iran, the gay-hating, women-stoning, free-speech-suppressing mullahs continue to fund murderous attacks against Americans and Jews worldwide, threatening Israel with nuclear annihilation.

And in Gaza, bloodthirsty Hamas terrorists fire rockets at Israelis from homes, schools, and mosques while sacrificing Palestinian babies as human shields, and using Palestinian children as slave labor to build terror tunnels in its never-ending genocidal war against the Jews.

But through all this, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon continues his addiction to condemnations of Israel, castigating the Middle East’s only democracy as it acts in self-defense against the blood-thirsty Hamas death-cult.

His repeated statements of moral equivalency between Hamas and Israel are an affront to decency. A recent bipartisan letter from U.S. senators to Ban Ki-moon scolded his comparison of the “deliberate terrorist attack on civilians” by Hamas to the “measured response of a nation-state trying to defend its citizens.”

As Israel has waged a fierce war against Hamas to stop the thousands of murderous rockets raining down on its cities, Ban has called Israel’s actions “unjustifiable,” “a moral outrage,” “a criminal act,” “reprehensible,” and “a gross violation of international law.”

Ban called on Israel to demolish its security fence along Judea and Samaria even though he has made no such similar call of his native South Korea to destroy the fence on the 38th parallel that protects his homeland from Pyongyang.

Ban has held Israel accountable for the deaths of Palestinian civilians even when it is clear that Hamas routinely fires rockets from schools, hospitals, mosques, and private homes.

The Washington Post reported on July 31 that the United Nations has found troves of rockets hidden in three of its (Hamas’) schools since the conflict began.

The Post also reported in July that, “during one short-lived lull in rocket fire,” William Booth, the Post’s Jerusalem bureau chief, saw a “group of men” at a mosque in northern Gaza. They said they had returned to clean up glass from shattered windows. “But they could be seen moving small rockets into the mosque.” He also reported that Shifa Hospital in Gaza City had “become a de facto headquarters for Hamas leaders, who can be seen in the hallways and offices.”

A year ago Ban was not nearly as harsh in condemning Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for waging a chemical attack against his own people, gassing upwards of 1700. Instead, he appealed for unity among world powers and sought more time for the inspectors to complete their work.

Ban’s response to North Korea’s three nuclear tests and threats of a pre-emptive nuclear strike against the United State in March of 2013 was similarly tepid, saying merely it was “a challenge for the international community.” While a rogue nation brazenly tests nuclear missiles and intentionally starves its population in a self-inflicted famine, Ban refers to these actions as nothing more than “a serious humanitarian crisis.”

Harsh and condemnatory language is reserved, it seems, solely for Israel.

Ban Ki-moon should focus on investigating real genocides in the Middle East and stop persecuting Israel, the region’s only democracy. The citizens of the world deserve a U.N. chief who can, at the very least, distinguish between right and wrong.

Israel downed a drone over Golan after it was identified as a Hizballah Ababil 2.

DEBKAfie’s military sources report exclusively that the UAV, shot down Sunday Aug. 31 by an Israeli Patriot battery over Quneitra on the Golan, was launched by Hizballah – not Syria as initially reported. The Iran-made Ababail 2 was on a photography and intelligence-gathering mission over the Golan battleground where the Syrian army and rebels have been fighting for control off the Quneitra crossing between Syria and Israel.

Our sources add that Hizballah launched the unmanned aerial vehicle from a Syrian air base attached to Damascus international airfield, where Hizballah keeps a fleet of Ababil 2 drones transferred from Lebanon.

When the IDF picked up the drone on course for Quneitra, the information was flashed to top Israel government and military decision-makers, who decided on the spot that the Golan military situation was messy enough without a new complicating factor entering the fray. And so it was decided to shoot it down.

Arrayed against Syrian troops on this sliver of land, are at least five insurgent groups, the largest of which is the Syria Revolutionaries Front. Another is the Syrian Al Qaeda offshoot, the Nusra Front. Around 1,100 troops of the UN Disengagement Observer Force are responsible to policing the buffer zone between Syria and Israel that runs through Quneitra.
The Fijian contingent’s 44 members, who were abducted Thursday, Aug. 28 by Al Qaeda, are being held in an unknown location as hostages for a ransom that has not been published.
Our military and intelligence sources reveal that, shortly before the abduction, various intelligence watchers spotted a number of Hizballah officers who had arrived on the scene. It was generally estimated in Israel that the Lebanese Shiites were not planning to join the fighting, but had come out of concern that Syrian rebels would manage to drive Syrian troops out of Quneitra and its surrounding villages, and then break through to the Syrian villages on the Hermon and the Chabaa Farms on the Western slopes of the Hermon range. From there, the way would be open for the Syrian insurgents to reach southern Lebanon and mount another front against Hizballah from the rear.

The Druze villages on the Syrian slopes of the Hermon are loyal to Bashar Assad and appear to be preparing to resist the rebel advance should it take place.
HIzballah sent its drone to bring back firsthand information on the state of play in the struggle for Quneitra, as well as on Israel’s military deployment just across the border. That was one reason for sending an Israeli Patriot into action to down the aircraft. Furthermore, Israel stood by last Thursday, when Syrian warplanes came overhead and bombed rebel positions in the Quneitra crossing, although this was in breach of the 40-year old accord for the separation zone’s demilitarization.

At the same time, Jerusalem relayed a strong warning to Damascus against any recurrence. Next time, Israel would shoot down any intruders. It was therefore important for the IDF to make good on that warning and down the Hizballah drone for the sake of deterrence.

US calls on Israel to reverse planned West Bank land appropriation, Times of Israel, Lazar Berman and Stuart Winer, September 1, 2014

A panoramic view of the Gush Etzion region of the West Bank (photo credit: Moshe Shai/Flash90)

The US has called for Israel to cancel its plan to appropriate about 1,000 acres of land in the West Bank, close to the spot where three Israeli teenagers were kidnapped in June.

“We have long made clear our opposition to continued settlement activity,” a US official told Reuters. “ This announcement, like every other settlement announcement Israel makes… is counterproductive to Israel’s stated goal of a negotiated two-state solution with the Palestinians.”

“We urge the government of Israel to reverse this decision,” the official said in Washington.

Earlier Sunday, the Palestinian Authority decried Israel’s announcement, with chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat called for diplomatic action against Israel.

“The Israeli government is committing various crimes against the Palestinian people and their occupied land,” he told AFP.

“The international community should hold Israel accountable as soon as possible for its crimes and raids against our people in Gaza and the ongoing Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.”

PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeineh said the announcement would cause the situation in the region to deteriorate further, and added that settlements in general are illegal, Israel Radio reported.

The military announced the move on Sunday.

“On the instructions of the political echelon… 4,000 dunams at (the settlement of) Gvaot is declared as state land,” the army department charged with administering civil affairs in occupied territory said. Concerned parties have 45 days to appeal, it said.

Critics said the move to expropriate the land near Gvaot in the Gush Etzion region, south of Jerusalem, was “a stab in the back” of the Palestinian leadership.

Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories Major-General Yoav Mordechai said that the move comes “as the continuation of the political leadership’s directives given at the end of Operation Brother’s Keeper.”

The Israeli army declared that there was no claim of Palestinian ownership on the land in question, the Ynet news site reported.

Israel accused Hamas of being behind the June 12 abduction and killing of Naftali Fraenkel, 16, Gil-ad Shaar, 16, and Eyal Yifrach, 19. The three were last seen at a hitchhiking post outside the settlement of Alon Shvut in Gush Etzion south of Jerusalem.

The abduction sparked Operation Brother’s Keeper, a massive search to locate the teenagers and a crackdown on Hamas in the West Bank, with hundreds arrested. The bodies of the three teens were found near Hebron on June 30, and a number of Israeli hardliners set up unauthorized West Bank outposts in response.

The Etzion settlement council welcomed Sunday’s announcement, and said it was the prelude to expansion of the current Gvaot settlement.

It “paves the way for the new city of Gvaot,” a statement said.

“The goal of the murderers of those three youths was to sow fear among us, to disrupt our daily lives and to call into doubt our right to the land,” it said. “Our response is to strengthen settlement.”

Yariv Oppenheimer, the head of dovish group Peace Now, strongly criticized the move and accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of having no real diplomatic plan.

“The expropriation is a stab in the back for [Palestinian leader] Mahmoud Abbas and the moderates in the Palestinian Authority, proving again that violence delivers Israeli concessions while nonviolence results in settlement expansion,” Oppenheimer said. “The Israeli government has once again proven that Netanyahu has no diplomatic horizon.”

The Gvaot settlement is currently home to a number of families and a winery.

Mordechai explained that the legality of changing the land’s status was fully reviewed before approval was given.

The three murdered teens, from left to right: Eyal Yifrach, Gil-ad Shaar and Naftali Frenkel (photo credit: Courtesy)

“The process was enabled after a detailed check by the Blue Line Team of the Civil Administration,” he said, referring to the special group of legal experts and surveyors tasked with reviewing and defining the exact locations of land Israel has appropriated in the West Bank.

“The decision to appropriate 4,000 dunams (1,000 acres) and make them state land is unprecedented and changes the reality in the region of the Etzion Bloc,” Oppenheimer said, adding that there has not been such a large land seizure since the 1980s.

Peace Now official Hagit Ofran told AFP that the legal basis for such land confiscation was an 1858 ruling by the region’s Ottoman rulers.