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Emory To Hunt Down Those Who Chalked Support For Trump On Sidewalks and Walls

March 24, 2016

Emory To Hunt Down Those Who Chalked Support For Trump On Sidewalks and Walls, Jonathan Turley Blog, Jonathan Turley, March 24, 2016

(Please see also, American Fascists. — DM)

495px-donald_trump_by_gage_skidmore

We have been discussing how colleges and universities are expanding the range of micro aggressions and hostile or hate speech to troubling levels in terms of free speech and associational rights. Now the expression of political views in the presidential election has been added to speech that students have declared threatening. Someone at Emory chalked the name of Republican candidate Donald Trump around campus. Nothing unusual about that. Students often chalk up statements on sidewalks for causes or candidates. It would not be seen as in any way unusual and the next rain brings a clean slate. However, the statement of support for Trump has led to a protest calling for the supporter to be punished or expelled and for the President to express condemnation of such political affiliations. The students want a statement of support for Trump to be treated as the same as the writing of a swastika. The students have said that they feel threatened in the wake of the statements of political support for Trump.

Students organized immediately after seeing the statements of support and had a meeting with Emory President James W. Wagner to demand action. Students demanded to know “Why did the swastikas [on the AEPi house in Fall 2014] receive a quick response while these chalkings did not?” They were not happy when Wagner reportedly responded that that was a case of an outside threat. The questions reportedly became more pointed like “What do we have to do for you to listen to us?” One student demanded that Emory send out a University-wide email to “decry the support for this fascist, racist candidate.” To his credit, Wagner refused to denounce a presidential candidate. The students then demanded diversity hires into the “higher positions” of the University, including the Board of Trustees and the faculty in general.

What was particularly chilling is the demand for action on faculty members who have not publicly denounced Trump or his views under the view that “[Faculty] are supporting this rhetoric by not ending it.” This failure, the students insisted, have created a threatening environment and that “people of color are struggling academically because they are so focused on trying to have a safe community and focus on these issues [related to having safe spaces on campus].”

Wagner is reportedly preparing an email and has launched an investigation to find the culprit. University police are looking at security cameras. What will they do if they find some student with the incriminating chalk? Will she or he be expelled or disciplined or publicly denounced?

I have some obvious concerns about such action. My primary concern is whether this is the truly the first time in the history of Emory University that students or faculty made political statements on sidewalks. I doubt it. Would the same effort to hunt down the writers occur if the writing referred to Sanders or Black Lives Matter or Greenpeace? If not, this would seem a content-based effort that raises serious issues of free speech. Moreover, the expectation of some of these students that faculty should be pushed to denounce Trump like some Pol Pot reeducation camp is chilling.

I have written previously how free speech is under attack in the West and we appear to be raising one of the most anti-free speech generations in the history of our country. In the name of “tolerance,” we are treating free speech as the scourge of society and a right that must be carefully controlled to “protect” others. These students believe that political views are now within the gambit of threatening speech. We have come full circle from the sixties where baby boomers discovered political and social activism on campuses — a time of great upheaval but also great exploration. However now that students and staff are embracing a conservative, the desire is to have official condemnations and investigations. Trump has clearly generated both great support and great opposition. His views, however, (particularly on immigration) are shared by millions of citizens. Indeed, those same views are prevailing in part of Europe. This is a wonderful opportunity to have a passionate and substantive debate. Why not let all political flowers bloom on campuses? Rather than immediately seek to silence those with countervailing views, the first inclination should be to engage in the debate and value the exchange of ideas.

Before Wagner takes action, the faculty should at a minimum ask for the university to address how it has previously addressed chalk art and political statements. If all chalking is now going to be treated as an offense, will the university be distinguishing art but not political art? The problem with chalk crimes is, forgive the pun, drawing lines on what is prohibited or permitted speech.

What do you think?

Categories: Donald Trump, Education, Fascism, Freedom of speech
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Soldier arrested after shooting disarmed, prone assailant in head

March 24, 2016

Soldier arrested after shooting disarmed, prone assailant in head Army says it will investigate after video comes to light showing aftermath of a stabbing attack on Israeli forces in Hebron

By Judah Ari Gross March 24, 2016, 3:09 pm

Source: Soldier arrested after shooting disarmed, prone assailant in head | The Times of Israel

An IDF soldier was arrested Thursday after a video appeared to show him shooting an incapacitated Palestinian assailant who had earlier stabbed an Israeli soldier in Hebron on Thursday morning.

In the video, which was first released on Palestinian social media, the disarmed Palestinian can be seen lying on the ground and barely moving.

The soldier then appears to speak with another soldier, before cocking his weapon and firing at the unarmed Palestinian assailant from a few meters away, hitting him in the head.

The Palestinian was one of two who attacked and moderately wounded an IDF soldier near the Tel Rumeida neighborhood, a tiny enclave of Jewish homes in the predominantly Palestinian city of Hebron.

An unnamed witness told the Palestinian Ma’an news he saw that the soldier walked up and “opened fire at him from zero range.” The witness also indicated the assailant may have still been alive before being shot.

The Palestinian Ministry of Health identified the two Palestinian attackers as Ramzi Aziz al-Qasrawi, 21, and Abed al-Fattah Yusri al-Sharif, 21.

It was not immediately clear which of the two appears in the video.

A picture showing the knife allegedly used in a Hebron stabbing attack, next to an IDF helmet, on March 24, 2016. (courtesy)

A picture showing the knife allegedly used in a Hebron stabbing attack, next to an IDF helmet, on March 24, 2016. (courtesy)

The soldier is partially blocked from view by other members of his unit when the shot is fired. However, the impact of the bullet can be seen in the video.

Afterward, the Palestinian can be seen bleeding from the head.

“This appears to be a serious violation of the IDF code and of what is expected of IDF soldiers and officers,” the army said in response to the video.

The Military Police will begin looking into the incident and the soldier has “been suspended from his position until the end of the investigation,” the IDF said. The soldier was detained for further questioning.

The shooting would appear to be part of a controversial practice known as “confirming the kill,” in which soldiers make sure assailants are dead by shooting them in the head. The army has disavowed the practice in the past.

“From time to time there have been some statements by senior officials on the side of abiding by the law and preventing unnecessary use of force,” B’Tselem spokesperson Sarit Michaeli said. “However, these comments go against public remarks to the contrary,” she said, referring to statements by Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan.

“It’s impossible to judge the situation the combatants are in,” Erdan told Channel 10 news last month after video surfaced of Border Police officers shooting a Palestinian assailant multiple times after he had been subdued. “Every day there are attempts to stab them and the civilians around them. There have been incidents in which (security forces) fired, the terrorist was not killed, and then he managed to stab again,” he said.

Israel has come under criticism from Europe and the United States for allegedly using excessive force in stopping Palestinian terrorists. The Palestinian Authority and some countries, notably Sweden, have accused Israel of extra-judicial executions — something Israel has vigorously denied.

IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot attends a Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee meeting at the Knesset in Jerusalem on March 15, 2016 (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot attends a Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee meeting at the Knesset in Jerusalem on March 15, 2016 (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Speaking to high school students in the coastal city of Bat Yam recently, IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot said that a soldier must shoot to kill perpetrators of terrorist attacks only if there is an immediate threat to human life.

“When there’s a 13-year-old girl holding scissors or a knife and there is some distance between her and the soldiers, I don’t want to see a soldier open fire and empty his magazine at a girl like that, even if she is committing a very serious act,” Eisenkot said. “Rather he should use the force necessary to fulfill the objective.”

“The army can not speak in slogans such as ‘kill or be killed,’” he said in response to a student’s question on the IDF’s “lenient” rules of engagement.

This incident in Hebron marked the first attack since Saturday, breaking a rare calm spell amid a wave of violence in the West Bank and Israel that has raged for nearly half a year.

In the nearly six months of Palestinian terrorism and violence since October, 29 Israelis and four foreign nationals have been killed. About 190 Palestinians have also been killed, some two-thirds of them while attacking Israelis, and the rest during clashes with troops, according to the Israeli army.

Israel closed off the West Bank from Wednesday to Saturday as a preventative measure against attacks during the Jewish holiday of Purim, the IDF announced on Tuesday.

The closure began at 1:00 a.m. on Wednesday and is expected to end at 11:59 p.m. on Saturday, the army said.

Entering and exiting the West Bank will be forbidden for Palestinians during those three days, with the exception of “humanitarian, medical and exceptional cases,” according to an IDF statement.

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Awakening from denial

March 24, 2016

Awakening from denial, Israel Hayom, Ariel Bolstein, March 24, 2016

In the hours after the Brussels attacks, Belgium was a country in shock. The train stations were flooded with uniformed security forces, some of them soldiers in full combat gear. But alongside their impressive equipment, there was an obvious lack of purpose in their deployment on the ground. They too did not know what to do, nor what to defend against.

The next day, this feeling seemed to grow stronger. The authorities appeared to be doing what was expected of them: They published the terrorists’ names, they carried out arrests, they declared three days of mourning, and they made statements full of determination and national unity. But nobody dared to ask aloud: Determination against what? And unity in the face of whom?

High school students stood for a moment of silence in the Market Square in Bruges. Passers-by scribbled messages of strength, love and peace on the pavement outside the Brussels Stock Exchange. But not a word was said about those who are not interested in love and peace.

As befits a country that loves visual expression (Belgian comics, anyone?), Belgian media responded to the attacks with a wave of caricatures and pictures that broadcast a message of unity. All the Belgian icons were recruited to the mission, from Tintin to the “peeing boy” statue and even Belgium’s famous potato fries. In one of the pictures, a figure holds a sign that reads, “We are all Belgium,” joined by a bunch of other figures holding signs that read, “We are all Paris,” “We are all Mali,” and “We are all Ankara.” The phrase “We are all Israel” was nowhere to be found. This total invisibility of Israeli terror victims was, of course, no coincidence.

There was also a notable absence of the words “radical Islam” in local media reports, despite the fact that the attacks were not random. The establishment prefers not to call the problem by its name. One could still think that the victims’ lives were claimed by some kind of natural disaster or chance occurrence. For years, political correctness has blinded Europeans, including the Belgians, and silenced every voice that didn’t toe the line.

Citizens saw more and more robes and burqas in the streets of Europe’s cities, but the elites sent out the message that everything was fine. Incitement flowed from the local mosques, but it was interpreted as the gentle breeze of multiculturalism. Western values began to retreat, and in many places, radical Islam dominated. Suddenly, even the police began to fear conflict with the thugs in the Muslim neighborhoods — and these saw that as a victory, a sign that they could get away with anything. First, there were attacks against the Jews. A cultural war brewed right under the noses of Belgium’s citizens, but they refused to take a closer look, despite the pungent odor of hatred that rose from the nests of radical Islam inside Europe.

And now, when the problem has gotten out of control, it seems that Belgium’s opinion leaders are still burying their heads in the sand. But that sand is no longer as pleasant and welcoming as it once was, and the echoes of the blasts can be heard through it. Yet, the sad reality is even more painful. The average person is starting to back away from the political correctness that does not provide security. Moreover, the average person is starting to understand that the enemy is not figurative — it has a name, and it subscribes to the ideology of radical Islam, even if those words are censored by the media.

“We are in shock, but this shock has helped us understand you, the Israelis,” a Brussels train conductor told me quietly after asking where I was from. Perhaps this is the beginning of the awakening from denial.

Categories: Brussels terror attack, Islamic invasion, Islamic jihad, Islamic slaughter, Islamic supremacy, Islamisation, Islamophobia, Multiculturalism
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Hashtag: We Are Neville Chamberlain

March 24, 2016

Hashtag: We Are Neville Chamberlain, Front Page Magazine, Ann Coulter, March 24, 2016

brussels-airport

Immigration is the new “No Nukes/Save the Whales” movement, only with more body bags.

After the mass murder committed by Muslims in San Bernardino, which came on the heels of the mass murder committed by Muslims in Paris, Donald Trump proposed a moratorium on Muslim immigration.

Explaining the idea on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” he talked about how Muslim immigration was infecting Europe: “Look at what happened in Paris, the horrible carnage. … We have places in London and other places that are so radicalized that the police are afraid for their own lives. We have to be very smart and very vigilant.”

Trump’s reference to London’s no-go zones was met with a massive round of sneering, which is what passes for argument in America these days. Jeb! said Trump was “unhinged,”

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) called him “foolish,” and former vice president Dick Cheney said Trump’s remarks went “against everything we stand for and believe in.” (Based on Trump’s crushing primary victories, Cheney is no longer qualified to say what “we” believe in.)

To prove Trump wrong, reporters called British authorities and asked them: Are you doing your jobs? They responded, Why, yes we are! The head of London’s police said, “Mr. Trump could not be more wrong,” and London mayor Boris Johnson called Trump’s comments “utter nonsense.”

Within days, however, scores of rank-and-file London policemen begged to differ with their spokesmen, leading to the following headlines:

UK Daily Mail: ‘TRUMP’S NOT WRONG — WE CAN’T WEAR UNIFORM IN OUR OWN CARS’: Five Police Officers Claim Donald Trump Is Right About Parts of London Being So ‘Radicalised’ They Are No-Go Areas

The Sun: ‘THERE ARE NO-GO AREAS IN LONDON’: Policemen Back Trump’s Controversial Comments

UK Daily Express: ‘TRUMP IS RIGHT!’ Police Say Parts of Britain Are No-Go Areas due to ISIS Radicalisation

Then, in January of this year, Trump talked specifically about the Muslim invasion of Brussels on the Maria Bartiromo show. “There is something going on, Maria,” he said. “Go to Brussels. … There is something going on and it’s not good, where they want Sharia law … There is something bad going on.”

The New York Times headlined a story on the interview: “Donald Trump Finds New City to Insult: Brussels.” News is no longer about communicating information; it’s about imparting an attitude. Trump is rude, so whether he’s right is irrelevant. As the saying goes, “Better dead than rude.”

Indignant Belgians took to Twitter, the Times reported, “deploying an arsenal of insults, irony and humor, including images of Belgium’s beloved beer and chocolate.” Liberals have gone from not understanding jokes to not understanding English. When Trump talked about unassimilated Muslim immigrants demanding Sharia law, I don’t think he was knocking Belgium’s beer and chocolate.

Rudi Vervoort, the president of the Brussels region (who evidently survived this week’s bombing), rebuked Trump, saying, “We can reassure the Americans that Brussels is a multicultural city where it is good to live.”

After multiculturalism struck this week, Vervoort said, “I would like to express my support to the victims of the attacks of this morning …” Twitter bristled with supportive hashtags, the Belgian flag and professions of solidarity. The Times editorialized: “Brussels, Europe, the world must brace for a long struggle against this form of terrorism.”

All this would be perfectly normal if we were talking about an earthquake or some other natural disaster — something humans have no capacity to prevent. But Muslims pouring into our countries and committing mass murder isn’t natural at all. It’s the direct result of government policy.

It’s as if the government were dumping rats in our houses, and then, whenever someone died of the plague, those same government officials issued heartfelt condolences, Twitter lit up with sympathetic hashtags and the Times editorialized about effective rodent control, but no one ever bothered to say, Hey! Maybe the government should stop putting rats in our houses!

When people are killing in the name of their religion, it’s not an irrelevancy to refuse to keep admitting more practitioners of that religion.

But this is the madness that has seized Europe and America — a psychosis Peter Brimelow calls “Hitler’s revenge.”

Apparently, what we have learned from Hitler is not: Don’t kill Jews. To the contrary, the only people who openly proclaim their desire to kill Jews are … Muslims.

What we’ve learned from Hitler is not: Don’t attempt to seize hegemonic control over entire continents. The only people vowing to conquer the world are … Muslims.

And what we’ve learned from Hitler is not: Beware violent uprisings of angry young men. The only hordes of violent, angry young men are, again … Muslims. (And Trump protesters.)

But instead of learning our lesson and recoiling with horror at this modern iteration of Nazism, we welcome the danger with open arms — because the one and only lesson we’ve learned from Hitler is: DON’T DISCRIMINATE!

Categories: Brussels terror attack, Donald Trump, Europe, Immigration, Islamic invasion, Islamic jihad, Islamic supremacy, Islamisation, Multiculturalism, Obama's America
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American Fascists

March 24, 2016

American Fascists, Bill Whittle Channel via You Tube, March 23, 2016

(What will America be like in a few years? It’s unpleasant to contemplate. — DM)

 

Categories: Bill Whittle, Donald Trump, Education, Fascism, Leftists, Obama's America
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AIPAC’S pathetic apology to Obama

March 24, 2016

AIPAC’S pathetic apology to Obama, New York Post, Seth Lipsky March 23, 2016

Trump at AIPACDonald Trump Photo: AP

‘Unprecedented” is the word the Washington Post is using for the apology issued by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee for the applause given to Donald Trump at its conference this week.

AIPAC is shocked — shocked — that The Donald criticized President Obama from the lobby’s stage. And that Trump’s jibe was greeted with a gleeful ovation from thousands of pro-Israel activists.

It happened when Trump was marking the betrayals by the United Nations, which, he said, is “not a friend of democracy, it’s not a friend to freedom.” It’s not even, he added, a friend to America or Israel.

“With President Obama in his final year — yay!” The Donald exclaimed. “He may be the worst thing to ever happen to Israel, believe me, believe me. And you know it, and you know it better than anybody.”

That’s what prompted AIPAC’s president, Lillian Pinkus, to apologize. “We are deeply disappointed,” she said, “that so many people applauded a sentiment that we neither agree with or condone.”

Forgive me, but the right word for AIPAC’s apology is “chickens – – -.” And it’s not just because Hillary Clinton’s address, with her jibes at Trump and other Republicans, was the most partisan speech at AIPAC.

It’s also because AIPAC has always been a stage for putting things into sharp relief. Of course President Obama isn’t literally the worst thing that’s ever happened to Israel (we Jews have had more than our portion of woe).

It’s hard, though, to think of a presidency as disappointing to Israel as Obama’s has been. Who, after all, was that “senior Obama administration official” who used “chickensh – – -” to describe Benjamin Netanyahu?

The insult was reported by The Atlantic not long before Netanyahu addressed a joint meeting of Congress. The magazine reckoned it marked the moment when, as its headline put it, “the crisis in US-Israel relations is officially here.”

No one is placing bets on this driving Jewish voters out of the Democratic Party and into the arms of the GOP.

The landscape is littered with erroneous predictions that Jews are going to start voting Republican, a fact that I’ve learned from personal experience in the newspaper line.

It’s not too soon, though, to say that we’re at a remarkable moment. Before Trump made his appearance at AIPAC, after all, there were warnings of all sorts of protests and walkouts.

In the event, the man who’s been endorsed by David Duke (and belatedly repudiated it) received a warm reception, marked by standing ovations. It prompted the editor of one Jewish newspaper, Jane Eisner of the Forward, to write that she was “ashamed.”

“The applause,” she wrote, “began after he uttered his very first sentence.” Soon some in the crowd were standing and clapping. “And, when he threw the red meat that he brilliantly feeds his other crowds, there were cheers as they gobbled it up.”

And no wonder. Trump railed against the articles of appeasement on which the Obama administration agreed with Iran. And this is not a Likud-versus-Labor thing. Both Netanyahu and the opposition’s Isaac Herzog opposed the pact with the ayatollahs.

As does every GOP candidate who addressed AIPAC this year, including Ted Cruz most forcefully. John Kasich declared that in the wake of Iran’s latest missile tests he would suspend the agreement.

The only candidate at AIPAC who actually supports the Iran appeasement is Hillary Clinton. Her chutzpah is so thick that it could be carved up with a chain saw and used to make bomb shelters — a point well-marked in The Post’s editorial Wednesday.

At AIPAC, she warned against the Republicans. She said the GOP would give them a “glimpse of a potential US foreign policy that would insult our allies, not engage them, and embolden our adversaries, not defeat them.”

If AIPAC’s delegates seemed momentarily confused, it’s no doubt because they thought she was talking about herself again. Or the reset with Russia, the war she plumped for in Libya or her victories in Afghanistan.

No wonder Trump, Cruz and Kasich got so much applause. AIPAC knows deep down that the Democrats have been a disaster in foreign policy. If any apologies are owed, they’re by the Democrats — even if that would be “unprecedented.”

Categories: AIPAC, Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton
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Israeli security firm’s advice on Brussels airport security unheeded

March 24, 2016

Source: Israeli security firm’s advice on Brussels airport security unheeded

DEBKAfile Special Report March 24, 2016, 9:56 AM (IDT)

 The Belgian government some weeks ago hired an Israeli firm, International Security Defense Systems, to inspect security arrangements at the Zaventem airport of Brussels.
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The ISDS experts, who were asked for advice on improvements, submitted initial recommendations for urgent upgrades. However those improvements had not been installed by Tuesday, March 22, when Islamist terrorists hit the airport’s departure hall with exploding suitcases, claiming more than 30 deaths and injuring scores of victims..

ISDS, which is also responsible for the security system at the 2016 Olympic Games in Brazil, was not alone in underlining the urgency of security upgrades at Zaventem airport in recent weeks. On Feb. 29, European Union security agencies called for an immediate overhaul of the security measures at Belgian airports and borders, which were wide open to access by terrorists and lacked the tools for inspecting passengers on arrival and departure.

After the attack, it turned out that Ukrainian security guards, who had been hired and posted at the airport, had mostly deserted their stations. The few remaining there had carried out only cursory checks.
Not only was Zaventem airport wide open to hostile infiltration, so too is Brussels’ second airport Charleroi, the terminus for flights to and from Algeria, Tunisia and Turkey. Although the Belgian authorities were warned that Charleroi presented Islamic State terrorists with an open door from those countries into Europe, passengers passing through were still not subjected to searches, even when they headed to Zaventem for connecting flights.

Finally, under the shock of terror, Belgium decided to stem the flow of terrorists by keeping its air space and airports shut to traffic Thursday.

Both Western and Israeli counterterrorism experts meet with skepticism the stream of reports the Belgian authorities and media were still putting out Thursday about the identities of the terrorists who struck the airport and Metro, their numbers and their methods of operation. An Israeli security expert commented that these reports don’t match the evidence and leave too many questions unanswered to be credible.
The account of the taxi driver, who said he had driven three terrorists to the airport, is one example. He said that his cab was too small for the five heavy suitcases they wanted to load onto his cab, so they only loaded three. Did that mean that five suitcase bombs were to have been blown up at the airport? And what happened to the two left behind?

Also at odds with the official claim of suicide bombers are the black gloves that two terrorists wore on their left hands, obviously covering remote control mechanisms for the bombs in the luggage carts they were pushing through the departure hall.

Despite the spreading shock effect of the airport attack, it is also becoming clear that the terrorists only accomplished the first part of their jihadist mission. The Islamic State, which approved the operation, had  envisaged a much bigger atrocity. This is attested to by the discovery of three bags containing identical kits of firearms and ammunition, a bomb belt, two AK-47 automatic rifles, magazines and hand grenades – all intact and unused. The police detonated them by controlled explosion.

Those kits were concealed in advance in apparent readiness to strike the emergency teams, the medics, the security forces and the other first responders when they arrived to tend the victims of the first attack. The kits were placed at strategic points,  either by an advance team of terrorist operatives masquerading as airport personnel, or a staff employee.
When investigators examined the submachine guns, they found that someone had tried to fire one of them and it jammed. This might explain why the second half of the Brussels airport atrocity, the mega-massacre, was stalled.

By sheer chance, therefore, hundreds of Belgian security officers and emergency aid personnel were saved from being trapped from three directions in a ball of fire.

Belgian police and security units have been chasing desperately, with very few intelligence clues, for a broad network of at least 20 Islamists, who must have spent months setting up the complicated Brussels operations at the airport and Metro station.

The planning would have involved exhaustive reconnaissance, the precise study of the targeted locations, arms providers, logistics, finance, communications and prepared escape routes – before the bombers went in.

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AIPAC Rebukes Trump’s Obama Truth telling, Ignores Hillary’s Insult to AIPAC

March 24, 2016

AIPAC president admonishes Trump and AIPAC audience for “attacks” on Obama, but Hillary love for Iran Deal was no problem.

By: Lori Lowenthal Marcus

Published: March 24th, 2016

Source: The Jewish Press » » AIPAC Rebukes Trump’s Obama Truth telling, Ignores Hillary’s Insult to AIPAC

Lillian Pinkus, president of AIPAC speaks at the Policy Conference. March 21, 2016.
Photo Credit: YouTube screen capture

On Monday, Mar. 21, four Americans who are competing to be the next President of the United States spoke to the thousands gathered in Washington, D.C. at the policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.

In what should be considered a shocking breach of etiquette, the morning after those speeches, the president of AIPAC gave a verbal spanking to one of the speakers.

The four speakers on Monday were the Democratic frontrunner, Hillary Clinton, and the three remaining Republican candidates in the race, Donald Trump, Sen. Ted Cruz (TX) and Gov. John Kasich (OH).

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders chose not to attend the AIPAC conference.

It’s hard to come up with a more familiar face at AIPAC than Clinton. Her speech was warmly applauded by the crowd and she threw out lots of the standard tropes: “defending our ally in the Middle East” and the “unbreakable bond between Israel and the U.S.”

The audience also responded appreciatively when Clinton repeatedly attacked Republican frontrunner Trump. Nor did they boo when she spoke positively about perhaps the most important – and detested – foreign policy issue of the past year, the Nuclear Iran Deal.

AIPAC spent an unprecedented nearly $30 million in advertising and lobbying efforts to kill the Iran Deal. That was because AIPAC leadership decided the deal was far too dangerous for Israel and for the United States for them to sit on the sidelines. There are many who believe AIPAC badly – perhaps permanently – damaged its reputation by pouring so much money and other resources into fighting the terrible deal, and losing.

And yet, Hillary Clinton praised the deal during her talk to the AIPAC policy conference on Monday. Of that Iran Deal, Clinton said,: “I really believe the United States, Israel and the world are safer as a result.”

Lillian Pinkus, AIPAC’s president, did not chide Clinton for, essentially, rubbing AIPAC’s nose in its loss on the Iran Deal. Nope, that would be bad form.

But what Pinkus did go after was criticism of President Barack Obama, who was, of course, the architect and chief cheerleader of the disastrous Nuclear Iran Deal. It was also Obama who said in words and later in deeds that he wished to put daylight between the U.S. and Israel.

According to reports, Pinkus was tearful when she gave a statement, flanked by her top officers, apologizing for one of the speakers who dared to actually call Obama on his misdeeds towards Israel.

In the context of rumored threats that the President was going to impose a “solution” on Israel in a U.N. Security Council Resolution, Donald Trump said to the AIPAC policy conference that Obama was “in his last year in office.” He then extemporaneously added “yay.” The audience responded with a roaring cheer and thunderous applause. Trump continued with: “Obama may be the worst thing to ever happen to Israel,” which was met with more, albeit subdued, applause.

Near the end of his talk, Trump said what so many pro-Israel Americans fervently believe, which is that “Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have treated Israel very, very badly.”

That so many in the audience applauded those statements by Trump – though he is not generally a favorite in the American Jewish community – should have lifted the blinders from the eyes of the firmly-cemented-in-the-Democratic-party AIPAC leadership. It didn’t.

Instead, Pinkus and her team decided to attack Trump for making his statements, thereby injecting their own political orientation to the mix.

No harsh words for Clinton who praised the Nuclear Iran Deal, AIPAC’s sworn nemesis, but a “tearful condemnation” of Trump for daring to speak from his heart about the current president, and an admonishment for those in the crowd who dared to applaud Trump’s temerity.

This was the statement made by Lillian Pinkus, president of AIPAC:

Standing before you are the lay and professional leadership of this organization.We speak on behalf of the Board of Directors and professional staff.

From the moment this conference began, until this moment, we have preached a message of unity.

We’ve said, in every way we can think of, “Come Together.”

But last evening, something occurred which has the potential to drive us apart. To divide us.

We say unequivocally that we do not countenance ad hominem attacks, and we take great offense to those that are levied at the President of the United States of America from our stage.

While we may have policy differences, we deeply respect the office of the President of the United States and our President, Barack Obama.

We are disappointed that so many people applauded a sentiment that we neither agree with nor condone.

Let us close this conference in recognition that when we say we must “Come Together,” we still have a lot to learn from each other. And we still have much work to do—because broadening the base of the American pro-Israel movement is essential and our unity is our strength.

Let us pledge to each other that in this divisive and tension-filled political season that we will not allow those that wish to divide our movement—from the left or the right—to succeed in doing so.

Thank you.

There are many in the pro-Israel and Israeli community who believe that the Nuclear Iran Deal is opening the door to another Holocaust. But at AIPAC, “Come Together” was the priority, rather than “Never Again.”

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Do Terror Attacks Doom the European Union?

March 24, 2016

Do Terror Attacks Doom the European Union? Power Line, John Hinderaker, March 23, 2016

Details continue to emerge regarding the recent terrorist bombings in Brussels, but the basic story is familiar. In Melbourne’s Herald Sun, columnist Andrew Bolt answers the question: Why Brussels?

Why Brussels? Why have Muslim terrorists in Brussels this week slaughtered 34 civilians in the city’s airport and underground?

Why did Muslim terrorists from Brussels earlier join the Islamic State attack in Paris that killed 130 people?

Why did a Muslim terrorist in Brussels kill four people at the city’s Jewish museum? Why did Muslim terrorists from Brussels have a deadly shootout with police last year and again last week? Why have an astonishing 450 Belgian Muslims–the vast majority from Brussels–served with Islamic State?

The answer? There are now 300,000 Muslims in Brussels. That’s why.

Brussels is Europe’s biggest Muslim city, home to a virtual colony large enough to sustain its own culture and hide entire networks of terrorists from the police. What’s more, the huge Muslim enclave is in a European country already torn between its Flemish and Walloon halves, making newcomers in this militantly multicultural land more likely to take refuge in their own ethnic identity, too.

Bolt argues that in the wake of mass Islamic immigration, it is too late for Europe:

The vast demographic experiment of the West–importing largely unskilled immigrants from an essentially hostile culture–has failed and cannot be undone.

Europe is now paying the deadly price. There have been mass murders by Muslim extremists in Madrid, London, Paris, Frankfurt, Copenhagen, Brussels and Toulouse.

There have been attacks on cartoonists in Denmark, riots against Jews in Paris, a rape epidemic in Scandinavia, pack attacks on women in Cologne and the assassination in Amsterdam of a film director who mocked Islam.

For Australia, Bolt writes, there is still hope, if that country “severely restrict[s] immigration from Muslim nations until we prove we can assimilate those here already,” and ends “[t]he state-sponsored denigration of Australia,” along with government-encouraged tribalization. The same prescription would seem to apply to the United States.

Meanwhile, persistent terrorism clouds the future of the European Union. The first duty of any government is to maintain order and protect its citizens. The EU’s inability to defend Europeans against Islamic terror, or even contribute seriously to that effort, makes starkly evident the fact that the EU is not a government, despite its nanny-state pretentions, and “Europe” is not a country.

But the reality is worse. Through the Schengen Treaty, the EU mandates open borders among member states. It thereby opens the door to terrorists, about whom it is powerless to do anything. With respect to the most basic duties of a state, the European Union is worse than useless. Thus, we are seeing the inevitable nationalist backlash across the continent, as Europeans try to re-institute borders and shore up the only authorities that have any ability to maintain security.

Categories: Europe, European Union, Islam and human rights, Islamic invasion, Islamic jihad, Islamisation
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