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To bigotry no sanction

June 13, 2017

To bigotry no sanction, Israel National News, Larry Domnitch, June 13, 2017

Linda Sarsour’s agenda is the abolition of the rights of others. She opposes the very existence of Israel. Among her statements and tweets, she has praised a terrorist who was involved in the murder of two college students, made the baseless claim that Muslim kids are being executed in the United States. Her statement that Zionists can’t be feminists obviously reflects the height of arrogance as she is a latecomer in a movement which had the participation of many Zionists for decades.

It would be a pleasant surprise if those Jewish leaders who defended Sarsour would feel so compelled to defend Israel when its reputation is so often defamed. Also, to all the Jews who rushed to her defense, a word to the wise: People like Sarsour may smile and express appreciation for your gestures, but are simply showing that they know how to play you. 

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The words of George Washington in a letter to the Jewish community of Newport, Rhode Island, resonate today as much as they did in August 1790. A small congregation of refugees and the sons of refugees who had escaped inquisitional rule in lands under Spanish and Portuguese rule, Washington assured them in these immortal words that the United States will assure freedom for all as it: “Gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance.Just months later, the Bill of Rights, whose first amendment granted freedom of speech, was ratified .

Just months later, the Bill of Rights, whose first amendment granted freedom of speech, was ratified .

They are, however, very different statements.

Not giving sanction to bigotry means that while bigots have the right to openly spew their views as protected by the first amendment, they should never be given prominence or legitimacy. It is a moral imperative to refrain from giving bigots a podium, since doing so validates their hateful message.

For example, after a long legal battle, the American Nazi Party was permitted to march in Chicago in 1978 under the (questionable) pretext of free speech, but the city should never allow them to lead a memorial day Parade. Doing so would be akin to sanctioning their hateful ideology.

Sadly in American history, there were eras when the hate of the Ku Klux Klan was given significance in disregard of the admonitions of the first president. The damage they inflicted upon rights of others, the terror they sent into the hearts of fellow Americans is infamous in the annals of American history.

Linda Sarsour’s agenda is the abolition of the rights of others. She opposes the very existence of Israel. Among her statements and tweets, she has praised a terrorist who was involved in the murder of two college students, made the baseless claim that Muslim kids are being executed in the United States. Her statement that Zionists can’t be feminists obviously reflects the height of arrogance as she is a latecomer in a movement which had the participation of many Zionists for decades.

The real question: How can any adherent to Sharia law, which demands the submissiveness of women, be a feminist?

And there should never have been a forum for her as the keynote speaker at any graduation ceremony.

What is abhorrent, however, is not just the perception that she is merely exercising her rights of free speech, but the acceptance – and even support – by so many, of her invective.

CUNY President James B Milliken stated that he stood by the school’s decision to have Sarsour as the keynote speaker at the graduation for the Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy. He offered the familiar argument that it’s a matter of free speech!

Several professors at CUNY who penned a letter defending Sansour wrote that she represented “new activism of young people, women, immigrants, and others speaking out against discrimination and intolerance.”

They are clearly expressing support for the keynote speaker. A letter from Jewish leaders representing leftwing congregations and organizations in defense of Sarsour, stated that they “do not offer our stamp of approval to every tweet or message she has ever posted.” Indeed, they might not completely approve of her views but they are sufficiently acceptable to come to her defense.

It would be a pleasant surprise if those Jewish leaders who defended Sarsour would feel so compelled to defend Israel when its reputation is so often defamed. Also, to all the Jews who rushed to her defense, a word to the wise: People like Sarsour may smile and express appreciation for your gestures, but are simply showing that they know how to play you.

Then there is the silence: The Jewish organizations that have not spoken out against Sarsour, will only encourage more bigotry.

The local politicians of New York with a few exceptions have also failed to address the matter. But it is more than silence, there are politicians in New York who have supported Sarsour.

The events in New York City this spring should put up a warning flag to those who prize the values of freedom and mutual respect. Freedom is not a given. It must be safeguarded by people of good will who can discern between right and wrong without the numbing influence of political correctness.

If manipulation and enmity is given a pass by the silence of the majority, then the freedoms which the American forefathers endeavored to safeguard might someday be in jeopardy.

Categories: Anti-Zionism in America, Antisemitism in America, Jewish left, Linda Sarsour
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Crossing the line to flirt with an assassination fantasy

June 13, 2017

Crossing the line to flirt with an assassination fantasy, Washington Times, Wesley Pruden, June 12, 2017

(Here’s a video of the assassination scene:

If a similar production featuring the assassination of President Obama had been presented, what would have been the reaction? — DM)

Julius Caesar

ANALYSIS/OPINION:

The liberals and the left have been flirting with the fantasy of an assassination of Donald Trump since the early hours of last Nov. 9. If all the rants and diatribes, which make up the conversation where snowflakes, “intellectuals” and the morally elite gather to chat and chew, can’t accomplish the elimination of the president by peaceable means, then why not by “any means necessary?”

Such fantasies are all over the internet, dismissed as the raves of the ignorant, the crazy and the foolish, but beginning to seep into respectable conversation, so called. The idea of terminating the president with extreme prejudice is the stuff of theatrics now, as in comedienne Kathie Griffin’s severed bloody head of the president. That was widely and roundly denounced, eloquently by Chelsea Clinton, once a first daughter with knowledge of what it’s like to deal with threats to the family. She rightly remarked that jokes about assassinating a president, any president, “are not funny.”

But that’s only the first public joke about killing this president. The second time, as this week in a presentation of the killing of a not-at-all disguised Donald Trump cast as Julius Caesar in a play in New York City’s Central Park, the “joke” was treated respectfully with all the caveats accorded by the educated and the respectable: “It’s art, don’t you know?” So shut up and applaud.

When Delta Air Lines and the Bank of America (both based in the South) withdrew their sponsorship of the play, part of Manhattan’s “Shakespeare in the Park,” The New York Times made a point of quickly endorsing the play as worthy of its continued corporate sponsorship, good citizenship be damned. Art must be served, whether art in behalf of mocking those clinging to guns and religion or art as a fantasy of killing a sitting president loathed by “people like us.”

A spokesman for Delta, which has sponsored Shakespeare in the park for four years, said that “no matter what your political stance may be, the graphic image of ‘Julius Caesar’ at this summer’s Free Shakespeare in the Park, does not reflect Delta Air Lines’ values. Their artistic and creative direction crossed the line on the standards of good taste.”

Bank of America, a spokesman told Deadline magazine, “supports arts programs worldwide, including an 11-year partnership with the Public Theater and Shakespeare in the Park. The Public Theater chose to present ‘Julius Caesar’ in a way that was intended to provoke and offend. Had this intention been made known to us, we would have decided not to sponsor it. We are withdrawing our funding for this production.”

Whether the director, Oskar Eustis, intended to stir up the mob or not, even someone of the artsy-craftsy persuasion should know that in the present atmosphere, not just in Gotham but everywhere else, fruitcakes and even more or less respectable “activists” need no encouragement to do great and fatal harm to America’s institutions.

In their fury to assuage their anger and feed righteous hysteria, many liberals and “progressives” cannot restrain their rage that Donald Trump, crude and all-around lout, has through lawful and constitutional means become the leader of the government. A fruitcake with a gun, bomb or long-bladed scimitar rightly imagines that these millions of Never-Trumpers would applaud whatever dirty deed fulfills their dreams and fantasies.

Eustis’ updating of Shakespeare’s play allows nothing subtle to get in the way of making his point. Julius Caesar is depicted as a petulant, blond tyrant in a blue suit, bathing in a gold bathtub, with a pouty Slavic wife standing by with wifely promise.

The drama critic of The New York Times observes that the play adds “immeasurably to the feeling that the story is not unspooling in some dim past but in Central Park tonight. In that sense this ‘Julius Caesar’ is a deeply democratic offering befitting … the public, and the times. If in achieving that goal it flirts a little with the violent impulses it otherwise hopes to contain, and risks arousing pro-Trump backlash, that’s unfortunate but forgivable. [The director] seems to have taken Cassius’s admonition to Brutus when Brutus is still on the fence about taking action. ‘Think of the world,’ he begs.”

But this is only a play, and the arteests and other retailers of Trump hatred insist that art is only art, and it’s up to the audience to keep art and reality straight. At least when it’s art in behalf of a righteous cause.

What could be more righteous to the millions suffering Trump Derangement Disease than someone eliminating the president? Like all of Shakespeare’s tragedies, the critic of The New York Times observes, “Julius Caesar” begins “with astonishing rhetoric and ends as an abattoir.”

Categories: Assassination of Trump as Julius Caesar, Media and Trump
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Terrorist attack in Tehran: Don’t be fooled

June 13, 2017

Terrorist attack in Tehran: Don’t be fooled, American Thinker, Hamid Bahrami, June 13, 2017

After the failure of the IRGC’s favorite candidate in the recent presidential election in Iran, the entire theocracy is at an impasse, fearing upcoming uprisings and anti-regime protests by the Iranian people.  Therefore, the IRGC, “the protector of the Islamic revolution and the theocratic system,” needs to create a security atmosphere to suppress popular protests in order to crush the domestic dissent and manage the internal feuding among different factions of the regime.

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Suicide bombers and gunmen attacked the Iranian regime’s parliament and the mausoleum of the founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Ayatollah Khomeini, in Tehran on Wednesday morning, June 7.  The so-called Islamic State (ISIS) claimed responsibility for the attacks.

Despite ISIS claiming responsibility for the attacks, when the dust settles, they serve the interests of the theocratic regime.  

Several questions remain unanswered in the aftermath of the attacks, which the Iranian regime must answer.  For example, how could the attackers just walk into the parliament protected by the IRGC and plainclothes agents, when even journalists and visitors are not allowed to bring a pen or mobile phone?  Why does the suicide bomber attacking the mausoleum detonate the suicide vest in an empty park?

The Iranian regime needs to pretend to be a victim of terrorism.

Considering the fact that the U.S. has increased pressure on the theocratic regime through a looming designation of the IRGC as a foreign terrorist organization, the regime in Tehran needs to deceive the international community – e.g., by diverting attention from Tehran’s own terrorist activities in the region.

Senior regime officials and IRGC commanders are already citing the attacks to increase Tehran’s malign and destabilizing intervention in the Middle East by dispatching more forces to Syria and Iraq.

It is worth pointing out that on the same day that the attacks happened, the U.S. Senate had planned to vote for new sanctions over the Iranian regime’s ballistic missile program, human rights record, and funding of terrorist organizations involved in the Middle East.  Not surprisingly, the proponents of appeasing the regime in Tehran and its lobbyists in the U.S. pointed to the attacks and demanded that the senators abandon the debate and cancel the vote that would put more pressure on Tehran to alter Iran’s unacceptable behavior at home and abroad.  However, the senators saw through this deceptive claim and voted 72 to 7 to move forward on the sanctions bill.

President Trump in a tweet rightly distinguished between the Iranian people and their theocratic oppressors, highlighting that the regime is the main sponsor of terrorism and that the real victims of these attacks are the innocent people of Iran.

The Iranian regime was furious and tried to deflect this reality by blaming the U.S. and its Gulf ally Saudi Arabia for the ISIS attacks.  It is interesting to note that immediately after the attacks, one of the Iranian regime’s staunchest lobby organizations in the U.S., officially known as the NIAC, begun to justify this line.  “And you’ll have a context that makes it possible for IRGC to seemingly connect Trump to Saudi, and Saudi to the #Tehran terror attack,” Trita Parsi, NIAC president, said on Twitter.

After the failure of the IRGC’s favorite candidate in the recent presidential election in Iran, the entire theocracy is at an impasse, fearing upcoming uprisings and anti-regime protests by the Iranian people.  Therefore, the IRGC, “the protector of the Islamic revolution and the theocratic system,” needs to create a security atmosphere to suppress popular protests in order to crush the domestic dissent and manage the internal feuding among different factions of the regime.

The ISIS attacks provide a timely pretext to do just that, especially at a time that has seen growing popular protests in various Iranian cities, in particular in front of the parliament in Tehran, against poor living conditions, the abysmal economic situation, and bankruptcy of Caspian, an IRGC-affiliated credit and financial institution that saw hundreds of thousands of ordinary Iranians losing their life savings.  Now the Intelligence Ministry has banned any protests or gatherings in front of the parliament, citing the attacks.

It is a known fact that during the civil war in Syria, only the Iranian regime has profited from ISIS’s existence.  Similarly, it is now a result of the claimed ISIS attacks in Tehran to intensify domestic repression and step up malign intervention in the Middle East.

Unfortunately, the Iranian people are as usual the real victims of the theocracy’s Machiavellian policy.  The West should not fall for this deception and allow the regime to depict itself as a victim of terrorism.  In the aftermath of the attacks, the international community must stand with the Iranian people and not their theocratic oppressors by supporting the former’s democratic aspirations and holding the regime accountable for its support for terrorism.

Freelance journalist Hamid Bahrami is a former political prisoner in Iran.  He is a human rights and political activist.

Categories: Terrorist attack in Iran
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ISIS Burns 19 Yazidi Girls to Death in Cages for Refusing Sex Slavery

June 13, 2017

ISIS Burns 19 Yazidi Girls to Death in Cages for Refusing Sex Slavery, Front Page Magazine,  Joseph Klein, June 13, 2017

(But as any fool knows, The Islamic State has nothing to do with Islam. — DM)

Don’t count on an American feminist march.

ISIS is Sharia-compliant in the most literal sense. Its fighters are following the example of Muhammad himself, the warrior prophet of Islam who captured slaves in battle and had sex with them. As the prophet was entitled to take advantage of such fruits of battle according to the Koran, so ISIS believes its fighters are entitled as well. Thus, these savages thought nothing of burning 19 Yazidi girls to death in iron cages after the girls had the temerity to resist having sex with their captors. This atrocity was said by local activists to have taken place recently in the Iraqi city of Mosul, which has currently become a battlefield between ISIS fighters and anti-ISIS coalition forces. An eyewitness reported that the burnings took place in front of hundreds of people.

“O Prophet!” the Koran (33:50) instructs Muhammad, in the “words” of Allah, “Verily, We have made lawful to you your wives, to whom you have paid their Mahr (bridal money given by the husband to his wife at the time of marriage), and those whom your right hand possesses – whom Allah has given to you.” The latter bounty from Allah refers to the females taken captive in battle and enslaved.

In an article entitled “ISIS Enshrines a Theology of Rape,” the New York Times reported on the religious sources ISIS fighters have used to justify their rapes of their female slaves. They believe that having sex with their infidel slaves, including with young girls, actually brings them closer to Allah. Indeed, they would pray before and after they raped their victims.

Islamist apologists and so-called “scholars” have sought to refute any interpretation of the Koran that could possibly lend support today for slavery and sexual exploitation of female captives. However, Prophet Muhammad’s own actions and words, which are called “Sunnah” and are part of Sharia law along with the Koran itself, belie such revisionist readings.

Cole Bunzel, a scholar of Islamic theology at Princeton University, is cited in the New York Times article for offering his counterpoint to the revisionists. He appears to believe that ISIS is simply scraping away all the layers of modernist interpretations to return to Islam in its purest original form: “There is a great deal of scripture that sanctions slavery. You can argue that it is no longer relevant and has fallen into abeyance. ISIS would argue that these institutions need to be revived, because that is what the Prophet and his companions did.”

While not manifesting itself yet in the United States in overt support of sexual enslavement of women, Sharia law is creeping into the United States.  Islamic prayers are being held in some public schools, in clear violation of the First Amendment’s establishment clause that has been used to bar Judeo-Christian prayers in the public schools. And in a shocking preview of what may lie ahead for the influence of Sharia law in U.S. courts, a trial court judge in New Jersey refused to issue a restraining order against a Muslim husband who allegedly raped his wife. The trial judge accepted the plaintiff’s claim that the defendant had engaged in sexual relations with the plaintiff against her expressed wishes. However, the judge concluded that the husband lacked criminal intent in this case because “he was operating under his belief that it is, as the husband, his desire to have sex when and whether he wanted to, was something that was consistent with his practices and it was something that was not prohibited.” Fortunately, wiser heads prevailed in the case on appeal and the plaintiff was ultimately granted a restraining order, while the defendant husband was convicted of rape. However, the fact that a judge in the United States could for one moment even consider, let alone rule, that a defendant should be exempted from the operation of a statute intended to protect women against sexual abuse because of his Muslim beliefs is disturbing, to say the least. The tendency of some judges, including some Supreme Court justices, to look at foreign law for guidance in rendering their decisions adds to the concern.

Too many self-proclaimed feminists in the United States have failed to express outrage at the oppression of women that is sanctioned under Sharia law. Instead, they have embraced an ardent defender of Sharia law, Linda Sarsour, who was chosen to serve as a national co-chair of the Women’s March on Washington last January protesting President Trump. She tweeted several years ago that “shariah law is reasonable and once u read into the details it makes a lot of sense. People just know the basics.” As someone wisely asked rhetorically, in reminding Sarsour of her Sharia tweet the day after the Women’s March on Washington, “basics like mutilating people…beating wives… killing apostates…killing rape victims…did i miss anything?”

The Yazidi sex slaves have learned the grisly details of Sharia law in operation the hard way. They have suffered the most barbaric forms of sexual violence at the hands of their masters, who have credibly argued that they are simply following in the footsteps of Prophet Mohammad and complying with Sharia law in its purest, most literal form.

Categories: Islam and females, Islamic State, Mohammad and females, Sharia law and females
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White House: Middle East Crisis Sparked By Trump’s Demand to End Support for Extremists Groups

June 13, 2017

White House: Middle East Crisis Sparked By Trump’s Demand to End Support for Extremists Groups, Washington Free Beacon, , June 13, 2017

(Please see also, Military crisis in Qatar may spark Gaza outbreak — DM)

US President Donald Trump (R) and Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim Bin Hamad Al-Thani take part in a bilateral meeting at a hotel in Riyadh on May 21, 2017. / AFP PHOTO / MANDEL NGAN (Photo credit should read MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty Images)

A percolating crisis in the Middle East over a top U.S. military ally’s support for extremist terror groups was ignited by President Donald Trump’s demand that U.S. allies in the Arab world end their support for Islamic extremism, according to senior U.S. officials familiar with the situation.

Trump is seeking a more active role in mediating a growing dispute between leading Arab nations and Qatar, a U.S. counterterrorism ally that has long provided financial support to the very terror groups it has vowed to fight.

Trump’s recent trip to the Middle East—where he publicly and privately urged top Arab allies such as Saudi Arabia to crackdown on Islamic extremism—is said to have sparked a regional dispute with Qatar, thrusting the country’s issues with terrorism financing into the spotlight, sources told the Washington Free Beacon.

U.S. officials, both inside and outside the White House, have long avoided the thorny issue of Qatar’s support for terrorism in an effort to preserve military relations with the country, which hosts a major U.S. air base that is a central front in the war against terror.

Trump’s focus on Qatar is said to be part of a larger regional strategy that focuses on strangling financial support for terror organizations that long benefited from Arab governments turning a blind eye to the issue.

Trump’s push to crackdown on this type of behavior—not just in Qatar—is said to have fueled the diplomatic break with Qatar earlier this month, which saw several leading Arab nations led by Saudi Arabia ceasing all diplomatic ties with the energy-rich nation.

U.S. officials and administration insiders who spoke with the Free Beacon about the situation said that Trump is seeking to play an active role in helping to mediate the crisis and shutdown Qatar’s financing of terror groups such as al Qaeda and ISIS.

“Look, last month President Trump visited Riyadh and gave a historic speech challenging America’s Arab friends and partners to do more to combat the violent radicalization that is growing within Islam,” one senior administration official told the Free Beacon.

“And the fact of the matter is that even though Qatar has been an important partner in some areas, they’ve also been a significant source of terrorist financing,” said the official, who would only speak on background when discussing the sensitive diplomatic issue. “What you’re seeing now is a regional response to the president’s challenge, and Qatar is going to have to respond as well.”

Trump’s stance against Islamic extremism and willingness to call out state backers of the movement has forced U.S. officials, particularly those in the Department of Defense, to address an issue that has been downplayed in pursuit of preserving diplomatic relations with Qatar and other Arab nations, sources said.

The hope is this will result in concrete change, which has been elusive in recent years as nations such as Qatar play both sides of the terror issue.

“American policy in the Gulf has been a bipartisan failure for over a decade. For different reasons, both parties found reasons to ignore terror financing coming out of the Gulf,” said one veteran foreign policy official who has been briefed by White House officials on Trump’s Gulf region strategy.

“Even when Obama officials did talk about terror financing, they used it as an excuse to pressure the Saudis and others to cut off legitimate anti-Assad forces,” the source said. “President Trump has been clear to our allies and adversaries that the incoherence has to end. He called on the Arab world to clean house, and what you’re seeing is the beginning of that.”

Trump discussed the issue in Monday remarks at a White House cabinet meeting, where he emphasized that terror-financing issues have became a central focus for the United States.

“One of the big things we did, and your seeing it now with Qatar and all of the things that are actually going on in a very positive fashion, we are stopping the funding of terrorism,” Trump said. “They’re going to stop the funding of terrorism. And it’s not an easy fight, but it’s a fight we’re going to win. You have to starve the beast, and we’re going to starve the beast.”

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has walked a more diplomatic line of the issue, in a move sources characterized as a “good-cop-bad-cop” ploy.

State Department officials would not comment on Trump’s latest remarks about Qatar, referring a reporter to Tillerson’s public remarks last week.

“Qatar has a history of supporting groups that have spanned the spectrum of political expression, from activism to violence,” Tillerson said. “The emir of Qatar has made progress in halting financial support and expelling terrorist elements from his country, but he must do more and he must do it more quickly.”

Categories: Qatar, Qatar and Israel's enemies, Qatar and terrorism funding, Saudi Arabia, Saudi Arabia and Islamic terrorism, Terrorism funding, Trump and Middle East, Trump and Qatar
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Military crisis in Qatar may spark Gaza outbreak

June 13, 2017

Military crisis in Qatar may spark Gaza outbreak, DEBKAfile, June 13, 2017

A military crisis centering on Qatar would be a catalyst for an outbreak of violence from the Gaza Strip. And indeed, after the failed Sanwar mission to Cairo and the reduction of electric power to the Gaza Strip, Hamas spokesmen warned that an “explosion” was imminent.

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The electricity cutback in the Gaza Strip, engineered by Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas to flex muscle against Hamas rule, was just one piece on the checkerboard created by the crackdown Egypt, Saudi Arabia Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates have imposed on Qatar for supporting terrorist groups like the Palestinian extremist Hamas. Therefore, Hamas leader Yahya Sanwar had little to expect from his mission to Cairo last weekend to persuade the El-Sisi government to ease its restrictions on the Gaza Strip.

He arrived at the head of a large mission, in which the group’s military arm, Ezz e-Din El-Qassam was heavily represented. Their appeals to Maj.-Gen Khaled Fawzy, director of Egyptian General Intelligence, met with a list of tough conditions. When the Palestinian delegation balked, Cairo acted to tighten its blockade on the Palestinian enclave.

The Hamas rulers of the Gaza Strip found themselves in the same boat as their old friend, Qatar, in the week that their internal rival, Mahmoud Abba, docked payment for the electricity Israeli supplies the Gaza Strip. The power supply was cut by 40 percent.

From 2015, the emir of Qatar remained the only Arab ruler backing the Palestinian extremist Hamas with occasional cash donations to Gaza City and permission for its top officials to set up shop in Doha.

This flow of aid was abruptly cut off by the land, sea and air blockade Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt clamped down on Qatar last week over its support for terrorist groups and ties with Tehran. Sheikh Tamim bin-Hamad Al-Khalifa defied the ultimatum they presented him, and so Qatar’s banks and international assets have been losing dollars, its currency has plummeted and there is no money to spare for the Gaza Strip.

Qatar and Hamas are being pushed into the same corner.

The small Gulf island, which is the world’s largest supplier of natural gas, was been told by the four leading Arab governments to expel Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas officials from its soil, after years of providing them with hospitality plus pensions generous enough for them to live a life of ease and plenty, while also running their terrorist networks across the region and beyond.

Qatar was also told to discontinue its propaganda campaigns against Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the UAE, and shut down its main platform, the Al Jazeera TV channel; and hundreds of Egyptian and Saudi dissidents granted political asylum deported forthwith.

With nowhere else to go, these dissidents could potentially head for sanctuary in the Gaza Strip, making it a “little Qatar,” which is why Cairo further tightened the Palestinian enclave’s isolation by blocking all routes of access.

The Hamas delegation was likewise confronted in Cairo with tough demands by the Egyptian intelligence chief:

1. To turn in the Muslim Brotherhood fugitives they were sheltering in the Gaza Strip.

2.  Not just to sever cooperation between the Hamas military arm and the Islamic State networks in the Sinai Peninsula, but to surrender to Egypt all the intelligence they possessed about the jihadists and their activities.

3.  To discontinue weapons smuggling operations through Sinai.

After balking at the Egyptian demands, Yahya Sanwar was forced to leave Cairo empty-handed with regard to eased restrictions and humanitarian aid – only to find on his return home that the Egyptians had raised their biggest gun against the Gaza Strip: They had cut off power.

A humanitarian catastrophe now hangs over the two million inhabitants of the tiny Mediterranean enclave. Hospitals are cutting back operations, refrigerators are switched off, clean water supplies are dwindling because desalination plants are without power, raw sewage is dumped into the sea and sanitary conditions deteriorating.

Cairo asked the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah and the Israeli government not to relent, but to keep the pressure on the Hamas regime high. Ramallah must continue to hold back payment to cover Israel’s electricity bills, which suits Mahmoud Abbas’ campaign for bringing Hamas to heel.

But for Israel, there is a dilemma. Nonetheless, the Netanyahu government is extremely wary of breaking away from the anti-terror line taken by Arab governments, because this could put paid to the delicate ties established with them – especially in the military domain – through long and laborious effort.

In Jerusalem, it is therefore ardently hoped that the Qatar crisis is quickly resolved and Hamas and Cairo can reach terms exponentially for easing the humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip.

For the time being, there is no sign of this happening. On the contrary, there are indications of the crisis moving onto a military plane. Sources in the Middle East are not ruling out possible military action by Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the UAE against Qatar.

Read more about this looming potential in the coming DEBKA Weekly issue (for subscribers) out next Friday, June 16. 

A military crisis centering on Qatar would be a catalyst for an outbreak of violence from the Gaza Strip. And indeed, after the failed Sanwar mission to Cairo and the reduction of electric power to the Gaza Strip, Hamas spokesmen warned that an “explosion” was imminent.

Categories: Arab nations, Gaza, Hamas, Israel and Hamas, Israel and lelectricity for Gaza, PA and Hamas, Palestinian Authority, Qatar, Qatar and Hamas, Qatar and Iran, Qatar and Muslim Brotherhood
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Staging of Shakespeare’s ‘Julius Caesar’ Features ‘Trump’ Getting Assassinated

June 12, 2017

Staging of Shakespeare’s ‘Julius Caesar’ Features ‘Trump’ Getting Assassinated, Inside Edition via YouTube, June 12, 2016

 

Categories: Trump as Julius Caesar stabbed
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Libyan Security Committee Calls U.S. Muslim Leader a Terrorist

June 12, 2017

Libyan Security Committee Calls U.S. Muslim Leader a Terrorist, Investigative Project on Terrorism, June 12, 2017

Omeish and U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine. Source: Facebook

A prominent Muslim American political activist is included on a list of 75 terrorists issued by a Libyan parliamentary committee.

Esam Omeish is a former president of the Muslim American Society and remains a prominent figure at the Dar al-Hijrah mosque in Falls Church, Va. He is among 75 people the Libyan House of Representatives’ Defense and National Security Committee labeled Friday as enemies.

Libya’s government remains fragmented, with the House of Representatives based in a city called Tobruk. It is considered closely aligned with Egypt.

Omeish is the 29th name listed on the terror list and is described as an “international member of the Muslim Brotherhood.” Another American, Aly Abuzaakouk, appears just after Omeish’s, also identified as an international Muslim Brotherhood member.

Omeish blasted the move in a statement on his Facebook page, saying “my name had unjustly and falsely been placed on a so called list of supporters of terrorism.” He protested Saturday to Virginia U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine, the 2016 Democratic vice presidential nominee, and plans to try meeting more members of Congress today.

Omeish wants the committee’s leader “legally prosecuted for fraud, slander and defamation to obtain a judgement inhibiting their ability to travel to America…” He also wants penalties for committee members who approved the list, accusing them of “randomly charging American citizens who have no offense or crime, or involvement with any of the forms of terrorism, and who are major in the American landscape in the fight against terrorism and working with all security and legal agencies to preserve the country’s security and the safety of the society and communities with transparency and integrity which everyone near and far knows.”

Omeish formerly served as president of the Muslim American Society (MAS), which insiders have acknowledged is the Muslim Brotherhood’s overt arm in the United States. In a December Facebook comment, Omeish wrote  that Muslims “have not known of the people of Islam … those more just in understanding, wider in approach and closer in application than the Muslim Brotherhood. We have not known of humane brotherliness and its people, (and we are affiliated with all men whom Allah has created a propensity for love, mercy, an upright disposition, good morals and honorable character) better in ethics, of gentler parts, deeper in adherence to duty, nobler in morals among all their sons, and every one of their actions than the Muslim Brotherhood.”

Last year, he advocated that the U.S. support for a group known variably as the “Revolutionary Shura Council,” or the “Mujahideen Shura of Derna,” despite ties between its officials and al-Qaida. Egypt’s air force bombed the group last month in retaliation for terror attacks against Coptic Christians in April.

Abuzaakouk also has deep Muslim Brotherhood connections. He has served as executive director of the American Muslim Council (AMC), and publications director for the International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT). He became foreign minister of the Muslim Brotherhood-dominated Government of National Salvation based in Tripoli after dictator Muammar Gaddafi fell. That group opposes the internationally recognized government in Tobruk.

The AMC was founded in part by Mahmoud Abu Saud, who helped Hassan al-Banna create the Brotherhood in Egypt, the Washington Post reported in 2004. FBI officials have long suspected that the IIIT housed leading Brotherhood officials in the United States.

Despite his overt support for “the jihad way” and for the Brotherhood, Omeish has been close to Kaine for at least a decade. When Kaine was Virginia’s governor in 2007, Omeish was forced to resign from a state immigration panel after Investigative Project on Terrorism video showed him praising Palestinians during a 2000 rally for knowing that “the jihad way is the way to liberate your land.”

At a separate event two months earlier, Omeish similarly praised Palestinians “for their bravery, for their giving up their lives for the sake of Allah and for the sake of Al-Aqsa [Jerusalem]. They have spearheaded the effort to bring victory upon the believers in [Palestine].”

It was during a 2010 fundraiser for Omeish’s state assembly campaign that U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison – now the Democratic National Committee’s vice chair – complained that Israel unduly influence U.S. policy in the Middle East. “A region of 350 million all turns on a country of 7 million,” Ellison said. “Does that make sense?”

Ellison added: “We can’t allow another country to treat us like we’re their ATM. Right? And so we ought to stand up as Americans. Now some of us have affinity for other places around the globe. Some of us are new Americans and adopted America as our home. But whether you’re born here or whether you accepted America as your own voluntarily, this is our home. Right? All of our home equally, and we can’t allow it to be disrespected because some, by a country that we’re paying money to.”

In this case, Kaine serves on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s subcommittee for North Africa.

It is unclear what impact the Libyan House committee’s terror list will have, especially among U.S. policy makers. There’s no public information indicating Omeish was directly involved in any terror support. But he has openly advocated for “the jihad way” and lauds the Brotherhood, a movement which articulated a goal of creating a global Islamic state and serves as an inspiration for Sunni jihadist groups including al-Qaida, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad  and Ja’amat Islamiya.

“The common link here is the extremist Muslim Brotherhood – all of these organizations are descendants of the membership and ideology of the Muslim Brothers,” former National Security and Counter-terrorism Coordinator Richard Clarke testified in 2004 before a U.S. Senate committee.

There are twin bills pending in Congress that would designate the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist group.  The United Arab Emirates has already done so.

Categories: Esam Omeish, Libya, Muslim Students Association, Terrorist designation
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The New Media Should Drive the News Cycle

June 12, 2017

The New Media Should Drive the News Cycle, American Thinker, James Lewis, June 12, 2017

(Funding? — DM)

I believe that the New Media deserve major credit for deconstructing the Old Media narrative.  Right after James Comey’s much-hyped congressional testimony, several New Media sites picked up the real news – namely, that Comey had actually outed himself as a top leaker in the Deep Government by sending his own written memo, typed on government time, on a government computer, to attack the president of the United States, with no proof of illegal or unethical behavior at all. 

That should have been the lead story for the New Media.  We had the Comey leaker story, and we told the story, but it was reactive; it took the false narrative of Trump’s supposed obstruction of justice as the point of departure.  That seems to validate the false accusation against Trump and only pointed out its falsehoods.

The Old Media don’t play defense.  They play offense, and let the truth be damned.  The New Media are winning the battle for American minds, but they have not yet learned to actively drive the news cycle. 

As a result, Trump’s magnificent spectacle in Saudi Arabia, which turned the Saudis, along with 50 national Muslim leaders, along with Egypt, Israel and the United States, against Iranian aggression and Iran’s proxy state, Qatar, went more or less unnoticed.  Today, the Gulf Council alliance, backed by the United States, is starting to choke Arab commerce with Qatar, and if that campaign succeeds, the Qataris will have to back down.

On top of all that, for the first time since 9/11, we have pinpointed a major source of funding and direction for horrific massacres in the West – namely, Qatar.  This is a clear move against the Iranian terror sponsors as well, therefore this is a strategic move against the Shi’ite half of jihad.

The Saudis have to do much, much more.  But Trump (aided by Mattis and Jared Kushner) has started a major turning point in the jihad war.  The huge MOAB weapon against ISIS in Afghanistan is part of the strategic turnaround.

Some of the New Media have done an excellent job in covering the MOAB and the Saudi Trump celebration.  But we have not used this major event to drive the news cycle.

That is because we will leave the aggressive role in the media wars to the New York Times and its corrupt left-jihadist P.R. gang.  We have direct evidence for headline collusion and endless lying from the NYT-led media aggressors.

But the New Media should steal the lead from the NYT and its historically communist ally, the U.K. Guardian, which also controls the BBC.

We are like that losing football team that gives up offensive plays, so it gets pushed back and back and back.  Conservatives complain that we are always on defense.  But from our current state of play, taking the offense is not difficult at all.  All it takes is a changing of mindset from being a loser to being a winner.

Look at all the news driver’s we’ve missed.

Trump’s overturning of Obama’s bizarre and anti-American attacks on U.S. industries.

Trump’s opening up of U.S. hydrocarbon production, thereby driving down the cost of fuel around the world and putting OPEC in a double-bind.

Trump’s victory in getting Israel and the Pals to sit down and talk turkey on the details of a settlement.

Putin’s eagerness to ally with the United States to destroy ISIS, which also includes Russian Chechens, who assassinated children in an elementary school in Beslan twenty years ago and held Moscow citizens hostage in a theater.  Putin and his Russian Orthodox establishment hate the jihad, and they never want trained Chechens to come back from Syria.  Strategic cooperation therefore serves both sides.  One reason for the sudden anti-Russian hate campaign from the Democrats is easy to guess: the Dems are now getting lots of money from Iran.  This is perfect for a real investigative journalist to figure out the details, which are not hard to dig out.

What’s needed is for the New Media to unify around one of these themes – not to copy others, but to add value to their exposés – in order to drive the message home over and over again.   Today we pay too much attention to wacky Nancy Pelosi, as if her scripted and inarticulate verbal bombs are actual news.  They are not.  We make them news.

We can snipe at Pelosi and her wacky ilk all we want, but we need aggressive, positive news memes that all multiple New Media grab as a story – like Comey’s self-confessed corrupt leaking – and use to drive the news cycle.

I’m giving just a few examples, but the New Media are creative, and many people have unique insights.  (We are also much smarter than the mannequins of the Olds.)

Competition is good, but sometimes we should pull together and get our American audience thinking about a clear and present danger.  There are plenty of them.

One reasonable goal would be for the New Media to drive every other news cycle.  That would make it humanly possible to do, rather than being driven crazy to write alarming headlines every 24 hours.  We can follow the real news rather than make it up, as the competition does.

Taking the initiative in driving the news will require discipline and a willingness to work together – not as a mandatory rule, but when the opportunity arises.  The Comey confession to leaking to the NYT is one example.  But this administration gives us many examples.

A vigorous offensive style by the New Media might also stiffen the spine of Republicans in Congress.  It might help to guide and to be guided by the 50 million (or more) Americans who voted for Trump.

This is a once-in-a-lifetime chance.  Let’s not blow it.  Don’t copy the Olds.  Drive the initiative!

Categories: mainstream media, New media
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Report: The Top Muslim Scholar Calls for Death of Christians

June 12, 2017

Report: The Top Muslim Scholar Calls for Death of Christians, Clarion Project, Elliot Friedland, June 12, 2017

Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, one of the leading theologians of the Muslim world, who is considered the spiritual guide of the Muslim Brotherhood, has called for the murder of Christians. He was recently blacklisted as a terrorist by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt. Qaradawi, 90, was included in a list totaling 59 names of individuals and 12 entities listed as terrorists connected to Qatar.

Ahmed Adnan, a Saudi journalist, writer and political advisor based in Lebanon made the claim Qaradawi supports killing Christians in an interview with Al-Ahram al-Arabi.

“A call of Yusuf al-Qaradawi was intercepted in which he gave a fatwa to blow up churches and kill Christians,” he said in the interview. “This information is not from me but from a special source. This fatwa inspired training sessions in Libyan Islamist militia camps. These training sessions resulting in terror attacks that blew up churches and the incident of al-Minya.”

On May 26, masked gunmen opened fire on a convoy of Copts in Minya governate, killing 28.

Adnan also claimed in the interview that Qatar was indirectly connected to the Manchester terrorist attack through its support of militias in Libya.

The Ministry of Education in Saudi Arabia published an announcement saying Minister of Education Ahmed Ibn Muhammed al-Issa ordered there should be no book, articles, pamphlets or anything else written by al-Qaradawi in the libraries of the universities, colleges, school and departments of education.

Following Qaradawi’s listing as a terrorist, the Saudi-backed Muslim World League expelled Qaradawi.

Categories: Islam and Christians, Qatar
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