The Media That Cried Wolf

Posted November 15, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Judge Roy Moore, Media and Democrats, Media and sexual claims, Media and Trump supporters, Media credibility
Tags: , , , ,

The Media That Cried Wolf, Amerian Thinker, Tom Trinko, November 15, 2017

In a week in which CNN cried wolf when there was no wolf by falsely condemning Trump for poor fish-feeding habits, is it surprising that decades-old charges of sexual impropriety being leveled against Judge Roy Moore aren’t being unquestioningly accepted by voters? According to him, the only thing that he wanted to do was to meet other singles with STDs, that’s all.

We can all remember a number of times when the media has proclaimed a wolf was present when we later discovered they were wrong.

There is Global Warming… err, Climate Change where we were told that by now the world would be doomed but somehow that hasn’t happened.

We were told that the black man shot in Ferguson was holding his hands up to surrender.

In the last century the media informed us that overpopulation would lead to mass starvation. Of course, that was bogus.

We were told that many women had been assaulted by Trump but the fact that they all apparently disappeared after the election makes reasonable people wonder if there was a wolf.

The media can’t stop talking about Russian colluding with Trump even though after months and months of investigation absolutely nothing has been found.

Clearly a reasonable person would hesitate before assuming that salacious charges raised weeks before a contentious election by a highly biased news source is true. The media has cried wolf so often when there was no wolf that sane people reserve judgement until there’s more proof.

That attitude is exacerbated by the fact that when wolves do appear the media often fails to mention them.

We know that none of the major networks have mentioned the fact that for more than two months a Democratic senator has been on trial for accepting bribes.

We know that the media ignored a credible claim that Bill Clinton raped a woman.

We know that the media ignores the fact that thousands of blacks are shot each year in Democrat-run cities.

We know that the media has refused to cover the clear evidence that Hillary colluded with Russia when she was secretary of state and that her campaign colluded with the Russians to fake dirt on Trump.

We know that the media has defended Roman Polanski, who has admitted to raping a 13-year-old and that the media doesn’t mention that Woody Allen has been accused of raping a child.

A reasonable person would conclude that the media is utterly untrustworthy because it cries wolf when there is no wolf and stays silent when wolves prey on people.

Further the pattern is clear the stories that are pushed are designed to further the political objectives of the mainstream media.  The sins of liberals are ignored and any claim no matter how tenuous of impropriety by a conservative is incessantly repeated.

This is a result of the politicization of the major media outlets in America. Instead of diverse voices whose biases balance out, the major media are a monoculture of left-wing radicalism. Instead of trying to be objective, reporters and their bosses have become “woke” and believe that their job isn’t informing Americans but controlling what Americans think.

In the real world that’s called a propaganda machine, not a free press.

The Moore case shows the cost of this radically biased behavior on American democracy. Most people would probably want Moore to step down if the charges against him are true. But because we can’t trust the media we can’t be sure if the charges are true. That means that the voters can’t make the informed decisions about who to vote for.

Because we know the media has lied about politicians it doesn’t like with enthusiasm, we can’t help but think that they’re lying now because for decades Moore has appeared to be a good person.

But even worse is the fact that the media was perfectly comfortable with Bill Clinton cheating on his wife, sexually harassing subordinates, and being accused of rape. This incentivises Republicans to lower their standards. If it’s okay for Teddy Kennedy to kill a woman and Bill Clinton to be accused of rape, why should we be concerned if Moore did bad things decades ago?

Is it unreasonable for voters to wonder if the Washington Post manages to destroy Moore’s campaign with decades-old claims that every conservative who runs for any office will suddenly be accused of ancient unprovable acts of evil weeks before the election?

That’s the bad thing — unlike liberals, conservatives don’t want sexual predators in office, but without being able to know for sure what the truth is, conservatives may end up supporting deeply flawed candidates. When Clinton was accused, the Democrat response was to smear the accusers. Conservatives aren’t doing that; instead they’re, by and large, desperately trying to find out the truth because unlike liberals we don’t want our politicians to be moral reprobates.

If your liberal friends attack you, ask them if American Thinker posted a story based on decades-old claims about Moore’s opponent if they’d immediately believe those charges and demand that the Democrat leave the race? They’ll of course declare that American Thinker is untrustworthy while the Washington Post is a paragon of virtue. Then explain to them how you see it; namely that nothing the Post publishes can be trusted. Get them to understand that just as they’d reject an unverifiable report from a media source they don’t like you have the right to reject an unverifiable report from a media source you can show is biased.

The Moore story is shining a light on the critical problem caused by the mainstream media turning into the propaganda arm of the Democrats. For democracy to work, the voters have to have the facts so that they can decide. But in today’s America it’s nearly impossible to get facts from media sources that haven’t sold their souls to advance their agenda.

If Moore is guilty and he is elected, it’s because the liberal media has become so untrustworthy that people just assume they’re lying.  An unintended consequence of the media picking sides and intentionally slanting the “news”.

Use this as a teachable moment for your liberal friends. Point out that if the media is willing to lie about how Trump feeds fish in Japan it’s really hard to take the media seriously when it digs up decades-old charges right before an election. Get them to realize that we all benefit from not just a free press but an honest and free press.

There’s also one more lesson to be learned; not reporting sexual harassment will lead to a loss of credibility and more victims. If either of the women accusing Moore had gone to the cops at the time, we’d be living in a different, and presumably better, world. As it stands, it’s really hard to believe that these women were harassed when they said nothing about it for decades and then suddenly came forward just four weeks before a critical election.

 

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Filling military quotas with the mentally ill

Posted November 15, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Mental illness, U.S. Army
Tags: ,

Filling military quotas with the mentally ill, Washinton Times, Tammy Bruce, November 15, 2017

In this Oct. 17, 2017, file photo, Army soldiers hone their long-distance marksmanship skills as they train at Fort Benning in Columbus, Ga. (AP Photo/John Bazemore)

ANALYSIS/OPINION:

The Army very quietly announced in August that it will lift a ban on waivers allowing people with a history of mental health issues, as well as alcohol and drug abuse, to join their ranks. Even in normal times this should concern you greatly, let alone when the world appears to be preparing for war.

Meeting recruitment goals is one of the reasons for this dangerous decision to relax certain recruiting conditions.

USA Today reports, “The decision to open Army recruiting to those with mental health conditions comes as the service faces the challenging goal of recruiting 80,000 new soldiers through September 2018. To meet last year’s goal of 69,000, the Army accepted more recruits who fared poorly on aptitude tests, increased the number of waivers granted for marijuana use and offered hundreds of millions of dollars in bonuses.”

What sort of mental health issues will the Army now consider as potentially acceptable? Self-mutilation, bipolar disorder, depression, and drug and alcohol abuse.

Ironically, the original ban on these waivers was put in place in 2009 during a surge in suicides in the aftermath of the Iraq war surge. USA Today reported in 2010 that one soldier in nine left the Army because of a mental disorder, blaming the “emotional toll of multiple deployments” as the cause.

While the impact of the war theater can account for issues such as PTSD, in 2014 “the largest study of mental health risks within the military found that many soldiers suffer from some form of mental illness, and rates of many of these disorders are much higher in soldiers than in civilians,” CNN reported.

Moreover, “Almost 25 percent of nearly 5,500 active-duty, non-deployed Army soldiers surveyed tested positive for a mental disorder of some kind, and 11 percent within that subgroup also tested positive for more than one illness,” CNN noted. “Some of those conditions are related to the hard experience of a wartime Army, but [Ronald Kessler, one of the lead authors of the study] said nearly half of the soldiers who were diagnosed with a mental disorder had it when they enlisted.”

The Army argues they’re now able to safely make these decisions because of the “availability of medical records.” That’s nice, but here’s the problem with something like self-mutilation — it indicates a deeper psychological problem that a medical record may not illuminate.

The National Institutes of Mental Health tell us, “Bipolar disorder, also known as manic-depressive illness, is a brain disorder that causes unusual shifts in mood, energy, activity levels, and the ability to carry out day-to-day tasks.” Additionally, it is “defined by manic episodes that last at least 7 days, or by manic symptoms that are so severe that the person needs immediate hospital care. Usually, depressive episodes occur as well, typically lasting at least 2 weeks,” according to NIMH.

Not exactly an optimum situation when deployed to chase down the insane terrorist enemy.

Yes, many mental illnesses can be controlled with medication, but that also relies on the patient taking that medication. In a theater of war, the risks are already monumentally high. Why would we put any troop at even greater risk by adding the unpredictable element of mental illness or drug abuse?

We still hear arguments about needing to end “shame” about mental illness, but this has nothing to with shame, and everything to do with fairness and safety, including for those afflicted.

In May, 2017, three months before the Army decided to lift the ban, “Most troops booted from the military for misconduct had mental issues” was the headline at USA Today. “More than three of every five troops dismissed from service for misconduct from 2011-2015 had been diagnosed” with a mental disorder. With their less-than-honorable discharges these troops may lose their VA health benefits.

Former Army physician Mike Simpson, who served more than three decades in the military, told the Daily Caller Foundation, ” ‘Few people would argue that military life is stressful, and can expose any weakness in a person’s mental armor,’ Dr. Simpson said. ‘This is particularly true today, as we are engaged in a dynamic and asymmetrical war on terror throughout the globe. Today, more than ever, we need to be recruiting the most mentally and physically resilient recruits possible for our military. Now is not a time to lower standards. On the contrary, mental and psychological screening should be even more stringent.’ “

Last year, the VA study found that 20 veterans commit suicide every day. We can work to mitigate the psychological impact of the war experience on those psychologically healthy. But if we have any respect for our fellow citizens and loved ones struggling with mental illness, the last thing we should do is place them in the most dangerous physical and psychological environments that man has created in order to meet a quota.

• Tammy Bruce, author and Fox News contributor, is a radio talk show host.

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Congressmen: U.S. Ceding Syria to Iran, Causing Rift With Israel

Posted November 14, 2017 by Peter Hofman
Categories: Uncategorized

Lawmakers urge Trump admin for strategy to remove Iranian presence from Syria

BY:

Congressmen: U.S. Ceding Syria to Iran, Causing Rift With Israel

A large, bipartisan delegation of lawmakers warned the Trump administration on Tuesday that its regional policies are laying the groundwork for Iran to takeover Syria, according to a letter sent to the State Department that urged the administration to present Congress with a plan for combating the Islamic Republic’s foothold in the war torn country.

Nearly 50 members of Congress who recently returned from a trip to the Middle East warned Secretary of State Rex Tillerson that Syria is falling into Iran’s hands, a situation that has caused anxiety among Israeli leaders, according to a copy of the letter obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.

The two-page letter includes intelligence that Iran is using Syria to establish weapons factories that arm the Lebanese terror group Hezbollah. If the United States does not take immediate action to combat Iran’s presence in Syria it is likely to establish a permanent military foothold in the country, which would endanger U.S. troops and allies such as Israel.

The letter comes as many in Congress on both sides of the aisle have begun to express concerns about what they say is the Trump administration’s failure to effectively combat Iran’s growing military foothold across the Middle East, including in Syria, Yemen, Iraq, Lebanon, and elsewhere.

The situation has become so pressing that Congress is requesting the Trump administration present it with a concrete plan to combat Iran’s growing military foothold in Syria, according to the latest letter.

“Should Iran be allowed to maintain a permanent military presence in Syria, it would pose a significant threat to Israel, Jordan, and United States interests,” the delegation of more than 40 lawmakers wrote. “A permanent Iranian presence in Syria would connect Lebanon-based Hezbollah to Iran via Iraq and Syria. This would give Iran the ability to project power from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean Sea.”

“Any agreement or policy that allows Iran to station forces on or near Israel and Jordan’s border does not serve U.S. interests,” the letter stated.

As a result of the situation, the lawmakers are requesting the Trump administration’s State Department offer a formal plan to combat Iran’s military presence in Syria.

“We urge you to come to Congress with a strategy for Syria that includes how the United States plans to prevent Iran from gaining a permanent foothold on Israel and Jordan’s doorstep and to block Iranian arms exports to Hezbollah,” they wrote.

Rep. Brian Mast (R., Fla.), a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and one of the letter’s authors, told the Washington Free Beacon that Israeli leaders expressed concerns about Iran’s operations in Syria during recent meetings.

“After my time in the Army, I volunteered to serve alongside the IDF because Israel and the United States stand for the same values: freedom, democracy and mutual respect for all people,” Mast said. “During my last trip to Israel, I heard directly from Israeli military leaders about Iranian operations in Syria.”

“The United States urgently needs a strategy for Syria that includes plans to prevent Iran from encroaching on Israel and Jordan, as well as blocking Iranian arms exports to Hezbollah,” Mast said.

Other congressional leaders who signed the letter include Republican Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.), Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer (Md.), and a contingent of foreign policy leaders in the House.

The lawmakers say they are aware of evidence that Iran has deployed to Syria anywhere from 1,300 to 1,800 of its elite Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps fighters.

This marks “a significant departure from a historical policy of keeping regular army forces within Iran’s borders,” according to the lawmakers.

Iran also has directed Hezbollah forces and other militia fighters to battle on behalf of Syrian President Bashar al Assad, the lawmakers said.

The war in Syria has provided Iranian-backed forces with “extensive know-how in offensive operations” and boosted coordination between the Islamic Republic and Russian air force, the lawmakers warn.

“As the tactical experience of its fighters has grown, so has its weapons stockpile,” they wrote. “Hezbollah’s 150,000 rockets and missiles is larger than that of most states and could pose a grave military threat to Israel.”

There have been additional reports that Iran is building weapons factories in Syria to produce precision guided missiles for Hezbollah.

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PM: If it weren’t for Israel, Iran would already have nuclear weapons

Posted November 14, 2017 by Joseph Wouk
Categories: Uncategorized
http://www.israelhayom.com/2017/11/14/pm-if-it-werent-for-israel-iran-would-already-have-nuclear-weapons/

Responding to U.S.-Russian statement outlining principles for post-war Syria, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says only Israel’s security needs will guide its actions in Syria • “We are making sure Israel is secure and we are doing it well,” he says.

Mati Tuchfeld, Shlomo Cesana and Gideon Allon

If Israel had not taken action, Iran would already possess nuclear weapons, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday, in response to a joint U.S.-Russian statement Saturday outlining principles for post-war Syria.

Iran is a longtime backer of Syrian President Bashar Assad. Israel has long complained about the involvement of Iran and Iranian proxy Hezbollah in the ongoing civil war in Syria. Israel has said it will not tolerate the presence of Iran or its Shiite allies in Syria, particularly near Syria’s shared border with Israel.

Israel signaled on Sunday that it would keep up military strikes to thwart the delivery of weapons to Hezbollah, as well as to prevent any encroachment by Iranian-allied forces.

“We are making sure Israel is secure, and we are doing it well – you know that,” Netanyahu told his Likud party at their weekly meeting on Monday.

“We are doing it with a balanced combination of strength and responsibility. We are defending our borders, we are defending our country and we will continue to do this,” he said.

“I have communicated to our friends in Washington, first of all, and also to our friends in Moscow that Israel will take action in Syria, including southern Syria, as we see fit and according to our security needs. That is the deciding factor, and it will continue to be the deciding factor.”

Later, during an address before the Knesset plenum, Netanyahu said that “we are standing shoulder to shoulder with the Arab world’s moderate states. Together we are confronting the threat of radical Islam, whether it comes from the direction of Iran or of ISIS or from others.”

“If it hadn’t been for our [Israel’s] actions, Iran would have become nuclear a long time ago. Iran knows very well, and everyone here should know, that we will not tolerate [Iran’s] military presence in Syria,” he said. “At this point, the only reason Iran does not possess nuclear weapons is because of our activity.”

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Normalizing anti-Semitism on campus

Posted November 14, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Academia and antisemitism, Academia and freedom of speech, Academia and Israel, Academia and Palestinians, McGill University
Tags: , , , ,

Normalizing anti-Semitism on campus, Israel National News, Dr. Richard L. Cravatts, November 13, 2017

Progressive students have decided, from within their own moral self-righteousness, that the Palestinian campaign for self-determination is such a sacred cause that anyone who questions it or expresses the Israeli point of view is a moral retrograde. To support Israel is to risk being deemed a racist, an imperialist, a tacit supporter of apartheid. And more than that: if you are Jewish, or even a non-Jewish student with no connection to Palestinian Arabs or Israelis who has not publicly proclaimed his or her allegiance to the Palestinian cause and denounced the Israeli one, he or she can be deemed morally unworthy of serving as a student leader or even, in the South African instance, of attending a particular university.

The student leaders who, in the context of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, now try to suppress all thought of which they disapprove have sacrificed one of the core values for which the university exists. In their zeal to be inclusive, and to recognize the needs and aspirations of victim groups, they pretend to foster inquiry but have actually stifled it. The first victim in the dilution of academic free speech and debate has been the truth.

***************************

At McGill University recently, three board members of the University’s Students’ Society were removed from their appointments after a vote at the Fall General Assembly due to their alleged “Jewish conflict of interest.” The ouster was led by a pro-BDS student group, Democratize McGill, which was campaigning against pro-Israel students in the wake of a September ruling by the Judicial Board that had rejected the BDS movement on the McGill campus once and for all. This was done on the grounds that the movement failed to uphold the university’s constitution by “violat[ing] the rights of [Israeli] students to represent themselves” and discriminating on the basis of national origin.

In retaliation, and to eliminate pro-Israel views on the board, Democratize McGill launched an effort to purge the board of BDS opponents. This effort was based on the cynical notion that such opponents harbored a clear conflict of interest that arose from their purported biases. Because the students in question were Jewish or pro-Israel (or both), they were labeled by Democratize McGill as incapable of making informed or fair decisions as student leaders.

In stating this premise, the pro-BDS students ignored their own obvious biases as well as the lack of any balance in their own views on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. They nonetheless felt entirely comfortable suppressing pro-Israel voices and Jewish students on the board, asserting that they sought to remove these students because they “are all either fellows at the Canadian Jewish Political Affairs Committee (CJPAC), an organization whose explicit mandate is to promote pro-Israel discourse in Canadian politics, or primary organizers for the anti-BDS initiative at McGill.”

Those students were to be disqualified, in other words, for having views that differed from those of the student leaders who sought to purge them. The Jewish board member and two other non-Jewish, pro-Israel board members were subsequently voted off the board.

McGill has a history of seeking to suppress pro-Israel expression, not only in the student government but also in its press. An example is a 2016 controversy involving The McGill Daily, which made the astonishing editorial admission that it was the paper’s policy not to publish “pieces which promote a Zionist worldview, or any other ideology which we consider oppressive.”

“While we recognize that, for some, Zionism represents an important freedom project,” the editors wrote, “we also recognize that it functions as a settler-colonial ideology that perpetuates the displacement and the oppression of the Palestinian people.”

Leading up to this revealing editorial, a McGill student, Molly Harris, had filed a complaint with the Students’ Society of McGill University’s (SSMU) equity committee. In that complaint, Harris contended that, based on the paper’s obvious anti-Israel bias, and “a set of virulently anti-Semitic tweets from a McGill Daily writer,” a “culture of anti-Semitism” defined the Daily – a contention apparently confirmed by the fact that several of the paper’s editors were BDS supporters and none of the staffers was Jewish.

An attempted purging of a pro-Israel student from student government, similar to the inquisition that occurred at McGill, took place in February 2015 at UCLA, when several council members on the USAC Judicial Board, UCLA student government’s highest judicial body, grilled Rachel Beyda, then a second-year economics student, when she sought a seat on the board.

The focus on her candidacy was not her qualifications for the position (which no one seemed to doubt), but the fact that she was Jewish. At issue was the way her “affiliation with Jewish organizations at UCLA . . . might affect her ability to rule fairly on cases in which the Jewish community has a vested interest in the outcome, such as cases related to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” as the student newspaper described it.

“Ruling fairly,” of course, meant ruling in support of the increasingly virulent anti-Israel campaign on the UCLA campus. Solely on the grounds of her religion, she failed the political litmus test that so-called progressive students, enthralled with their pursuit of social justice, see as their default position – being pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel.

The same thinking inspired a similarly discriminatory proposal the previous May by two members of UCLA’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), which attempted to bar Jewish candidates from filling council positions if they had taken trips to Israel subsidized by the Anti-Defamation League, American Jewish Committee, or other organizations. According to the activists, those organizations “have openly campaigned against divestment from corporations that profit from Israeli violations of Palestinian human rights.”

Of course, there was no mention in this debate of sponsored trips to send pro-Palestinian students to Israel or the territories on propaganda excursions designed to malign Israel and teach visitors an alternate, anti-Israel narrative. Once again, in addition to trying to stack the deck against the pro-Israel argument, this proposal took it as a given that anyone not committed to the Palestinian cause was by default not to be trusted, incapable of making unbiased decisions, and morally compromised.

A particularly odious attempt to rid a campus of Jewish and pro-Israel voices took place in 2015 when student council leaders at Durban University of Technology (DUT) in South Africa floated a proposal suggesting that Jewish students be purged entirely from the institution. As the student body’s secretary, Mqondisi Duma, put it, “We took the decision that Jewish students, especially those who do not support the Palestinian struggle, should deregister.” This is, one would think, a rather shocking sentiment from students who themselves benefited from a worldwide campaign in the 1970s and 1980s to end South Africa’s racist apartheid system.

The moral arrogance of the South African students’ proposal was breathtaking, and not only because of its grotesque version of the anti-Semitic practice of making all Jews responsible for the political actions of Israel. It revealed that the pro-Palestinian movement is so enthralled with the righteousness of its cause that anyone who harbors or expresses other views is considered a pariah, unworthy to have his or her ideas heard in the marketplace of ideas on campus.

Progressive students have decided, from within their own moral self-righteousness, that the Palestinian campaign for self-determination is such a sacred cause that anyone who questions it or expresses the Israeli point of view is a moral retrograde. To support Israel is to risk being deemed a racist, an imperialist, a tacit supporter of apartheid. And more than that: if you are Jewish, or even a non-Jewish student with no connection to Palestinian Arabs or Israelis who has not publicly proclaimed his or her allegiance to the Palestinian cause and denounced the Israeli one, he or she can be deemed morally unworthy of serving as a student leader or even, in the South African instance, of attending a particular university.

The student leaders who, in the context of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, now try to suppress all thought of which they disapprove have sacrificed one of the core values for which the university exists. In their zeal to be inclusive, and to recognize the needs and aspirations of victim groups, they pretend to foster inquiry but have actually stifled it. The first victim in the dilution of academic free speech and debate has been the truth.

Dr. Richard L. Cravatts, President Emeritus of Scholars for Peace in the Middle East, is the author of Dispatches from the Campus War Against Israel and Jews.

 

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The UN – here we go again

Posted November 14, 2017 by anneinpt
Categories: Anti-Israel, Anti-Zionism, Nikki Haley, UNESCO, United Nations and Israel
Tags: , , , , ,

The UN – here we go again | Anne’s Opinions, 13th November 2017

UN – Useless Nations

It was action replay time at the UN General Assembly last week, as the UN lived down to our expectations and voted to condemn Israel 9 times:

GENEVA, Nov. 10, 2017 – The U.N. General Assembly will condemn Israel nine times today, “part of its annual ritual of enacting 20 Arab-sponsored resolutions singling out the Jewish state, and making no mention of Hamas stabbings, shootings or vehicular attacks against Israelis,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of the Geneva-based monitoring group UN Watch. Click here for list of 9 resolutions.

By contrast, in this year’s session there will be a total of 6 condemnatory resolutions for the rest of the world combined — with one each on Syria, North Korea, Iran, Crimea, Myanmar, as well as one on the U.S. for its Cuba embargo.

All 193 UN member states participate in the initial committee vote today, and then almost always vote the same way in a second and final vote at the GA plenary in December.

“The U.N.’s assault on Israel today with a torrent of one-sided resolutions is surreal,” said Neuer.

“Even after Syrian president Bashar Assad has used chemical weapons against his own people within the past year, the U.N. is about to adopt a resolution — drafted and co-sponsored by Syria — which falsely condemns Israel for ‘repressive measures’ against Syrian citizens on the Golan Heights. It’s obscene,” said Neuer.

“While there will be a total of 20 resolutions against Israel this session, not a single U.N. General Assembly resolution is planned today or this year for gross human rights abusers such as Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Venezuela, China, Cuba, Pakistan or Zimbabwe.”

“At a time when Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and his state-controlled media incite to the continued stabbing and shooting of Israeli Jews, the U.N.’s response is to reflexively condemn Israel in nine separate resolutions, each of them one-sided, each of them utterly silent on Palestinian abuses.”

The resolution drafted annually by Syria condemns Israel for holding on to the Golan Heights, and demands Israel hand the land and its people to Syria.

Israeli military medics assisting wounded Syrians in April. Credit Dusan Vranic/Associated Press

“It’s astonishing,” said Neuer. “After the Syrian regime has killed its own people by the hundreds of thousands over six years, how can the U.N. call for more people to be subject to Assad’s rule? The timing of today’s text is morally galling, and logically absurd.”

“Today’s resolutions claim to care about Palestinians, yet the U.N. is oblivious to the dozens of Palestinians who have been slaughtered, maimed and expelled by Assad’s forces, and more than 3,000 victims killed since 2011.”

“Today’s farce at the General Assembly underscores a simple fact: the U.N.’s automatic majority has no interest in truly helping Palestinians, nor in protecting anyone’s human rights; the goal of these ritual, one-sided condemnations remains the scapegoating of Israel,” said Neuer.

“The U.N.’s disproportionate assault against the Jewish state undermines the institutional credibility of what is supposed to be an impartial international body. Politicization and selectivity harm its founding mission, eroding the U.N. Charter promise of equal treatment to all nations large and small,” Neuer added.

As a further example of the UN’s extreme insanity, there is a possibility that Iran will chair the next UNESCO Executive Board!

A diplomatic battle is under way to prevent Iran’s election to the post of UNESCO Executive Board chairman to replace Michael Worbs of Germany.

The words of Jeremiah in Eicha (Lamentations) illustrated perfectly at UNESCO

Israel has had a contentious relationship with the 58-member board, which in the past has approved resolutions that some say have ignored Jewish ties to Judaim’s holiest site, the Temple Mount.

US and Israeli efforts to block Iran received a boost on Wednesday when the Philippines was one of 27 countries the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s General Assembly elected to a four-year term on the board, effective immediately. Some of those countries are serving their second four-year terms.

In advance of the November 16 election, the board has been split between choosing Iran or South Korea to head the board, but it is possible that the Asia Pacific group will push the Philippines ambassador as a compromise candidate, a diplomatic source speculated in a conversation with The Jerusalem Post.

But the overall make-up of the board with the new members is seen as more hostile to Israel than the previous one.

Germany and the Netherlands lost seats and Turkey gained one. Jordan joined Egypt on the board, thereby providing additional support to any anti-Israel resolutions regarding Jerusalem in the future.

Whether Iran is elected or not, the result is almost irrelevant given the inherent hostility to Israel built in to the organization. The more important issue is the fact that a terror-supporting and revolution-exporting country, which is destabilising the Middle East and holding the world hostage to its desire to build nuclear weapons, could even be considered for such a symbolic post. In fact Iran should not be allowed to be a member of the UN at all.

Then again if the UN expelled every terror-supporting member state, there would be almost no UN left at all. Quite a comforting thought, all in all.

Israel’s Ambassador to UNESCO, Carmel Shama Hacohen, slammed the organization as “the Titanic of international organizations”:

UNESCO is “the Titanic of international organizations,” Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization said, accusing it of deliberately falsifying history to persecute the Jewish people.

Carmel Shama Hacohen argues with a Palestinian diplomat at UNESCO

In a scathing speech Friday to UNESCO’s 39th General Conference in Paris, Carmel Shama-Hacohen also slammed the United Arab Emirates for having given a gift to all member states but Israel, urging delegates to give it back in protest.

…

“UNESCO is the Titanic of international organizations, which was hijacked and led by the Arab Group into crashing the iceberg of politicization, and which has been sinking ever since,” Shama-Hacohen said.

…

He added: “Sadly, UNESCO has been hijacked and abused as a tool for the persecution of Israel and the Jewish people, while concocting fake facts and fake history, meant to erase our history in Jerusalem and rewrite global history.”

Shama-Hacohen dedicated a significant part of his speech to the UAE’s October 30 snub of Israel, though he did not name the Gulf state by name.

At the opening of the General Conference in Paris, the Emirati delegation had placed a box containing a silver medal on the desk of each foreign delegation in honor of the UAE having sponsored the renovation of the conference hall. No box, however, was placed on Shama-Hacohen’s desk.

…

“Even the inauguration of this very hall was contaminated with the poison of politicization, as the donor state handed out to all member missions a greeting letter and a medal memorabilia: all member missions, aside from one — Israel,” the Israeli envoy said Friday. “How petty, how primitive, how pathetic.”

The incident made clear once again “that petro-dollars can buy much, but there’s no price tag on wisdom, manners and etiquette. Your wealth might be in money, but in dignity you are poorer than poor,” he added.

…

“These wrongs are done in full daylight, and all keep quiet: silent accomplices to discrimination in sports: one of the foundations of education and culture, and silent accomplices to the attempts to isolate and ostracize Israel in the inauguration of this hall,” Shama-Hacohen said Friday.

“As for the silver medal, which was handed to you as a gift, I’d return it if I were you, so as not to partake in a despicable act which has no place in a free and enlightened world.”

Kol hakavod to those diplomats who took Hacohen at his word and handed him their medals:

Many foreign diplomats stationed at UNESCO gave him their medals — which bore a portrait of Hamdan bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the deputy ruler of Dubai and the country’s finance minister of the UAE — in protest of the UAE’s move, the Israeli envoy said.

“My initial instinct was to put it to good use as a doorstop,” he said. “However, after giving it some more thought, I decided to donate them to the Syrian refugees who are wandering the cold streets of Paris. These refugees include infants and children, who escaped the atrocities of the Syrian regime and the chemical attacks of that member of the Arab Group against its own women, children and innocent civilians.”

He added: “If you only invested in them 1% of the efforts you put in here against Israel, their lives would have been better.”

Watch his speech below. If only his English was better pronunciated he would make a much bigger impact. Nevertheless, kol hakavod on an excellent speech:

As a palate cleanser listen to UN Ambassador the UN Nikki Haley’s fantastic speech to the Israel-American Council as she blasted the previous Obama administration for its betrayal of Israel at the UN, and pledged staunch American support for Israel:

Nikki Haley is a shining example of what a diplomat should look like. Sadly she is a rare diamond in a pig sty.

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The U.S. Middle East Peace Plan?

Posted November 13, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Abbas, Abbas in Saudia Arabia, Arab nations, Israel and Saudi Arabia, Palestinian Authority, Palestinian funding, Palestinian public opinion, Peace process
Tags: , , , , , , ,

The U.S. Middle East Peace Plan? Gatestone Institute, Bassam Tawil, November 13, 2017

Abbas is now caught between two choices, both disastrous: On the one hand, he needs the political backing of his Arab brothers. This is the most he can expect from the Arab countries, most of whom do not give the Palestinians a penny. It is worth noting that, by and large, the Arab countries discarded the Palestinians after the PLO and Yasser Arafat openly supported Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990. Kuwait was one of several Gulf countries that used to provide the Palestinians with billions of dollars a year. No more.

Since then, the Palestinians have been almost entirely dependent on American and European financial aid. It is safe to assume, then, that the US and EU have more leverage with the Palestinians than most Arab countries.

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No American or European on the face of this earth could force a Palestinian leader to sign a peace treaty with Israel that would be rejected by an overwhelming majority of his people.

Trump’s “ultimate solution” may result in some Arab countries signing peace treaties with Israel. These countries anyway have no real conflict with Israel. Why should there not be peace between Israel and Kuwait? Why should there not be peace between Israel and Oman? Do any of the Arab countries have a territorial dispute with Israel? The only “problem” the Arab countries have with Israel is the one concerning the Palestinians.

The question remains: how will the Saudis and the rest of the international community respond to ongoing Palestinian rejectionism and intransigence?

Who said that Palestinians have no respect for Saudi Arabia and the rest of the Arab countries? They do.

Palestinians have respect for the money of their Arab brethren. The respect they lack is for the heads of the Arab states, and the regimes and royal families there.

It is important to take this into consideration in light of the growing talk about Saudi Arabia’s effort to help the Trump Administration market a comprehensive peace plan for the Middle East, the details of which remain intriguingly mysterious.

Last week, the Saudis unexpectedly summoned Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas to Riyadh for talks on Trump’s “ultimate solution” for the Israeli-Arab conflict, reportedly being promoted by Jared Kushner.

According to unconfirmed reports, the Saudis pressured Abbas to endorse the Trump Administration’s “peace plan.” Abbas was reportedly told that he had no choice but to accept the plan or resign. At this stage, it remains unclear how Abbas responded to the Saudi “ultimatum.”

Last week, the Saudis unexpectedly summoned Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to Riyadh for talks on Trump’s “ultimate solution” for the Israeli-Arab conflict. Abbas was reportedly told that he had no choice but to accept the plan or resign. Pictured: Abbas on a previous visit to Saudi Arabia, on February 23, 2015, meeting with Saudi King Salman. (Photo by Thaer Ghanaim/PPO via Getty Images)

If true, the Saudi “ultimatum” to Abbas is tantamount to asking him to sign his death warrant. Abbas cannot afford to be seen by his people as being in collusion with an American “peace plan” that does not comply completely with their demands. Abbas has repeatedly made it clear that he will not accept anything less than a sovereign Palestinian state on all the pre-1967 lands, including east Jerusalem. He has also emphasized that the Palestinians will never give up the “right of return” for millions of “refugees” to their former homes inside Israel. Moreover, Abbas has clarified that the Palestinians will not accept the presence of any Israeli in their future Palestinian state.

Abbas has done his dirty work well. He knows that he cannot come back to his people with anything less than what he promised them. He knows that his people have been radicalized to the point that they will not agree to any concessions or compromise with Israel.

And who is responsible for this radicalization? Abbas and other Palestinian leaders, who continue unendingly to tell their people through the media, discourse and mosques that any concession to Israel constitutes treason, pure and simple.

So it would be naïve to think that Saudi Arabia or any other Arab country would be able to strong-arm any Palestinian leader to accept a “peace plan” that requires the Palestinians to make concessions to Israel. Abbas may have much respect for the ambitious and savvy young crown prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman. This respect, however, certainly stops at the border of the political suicide – and extreme personal risk — from Abbas’s point of view.

Abbas is now caught between two choices, both disastrous: On the one hand, he needs the political backing of his Arab brothers. This is the most he can expect from the Arab countries, most of whom do not give the Palestinians a penny. It is worth noting that, by and large, the Arab countries discarded the Palestinians after the PLO and Yasser Arafat openly supported Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990. Kuwait was one of several Gulf countries that used to provide the Palestinians with billions of dollars a year. No more.

Since then, the Palestinians have been almost entirely dependent on American and European financial aid. It is safe to assume, then, that the US and EU have more leverage with the Palestinians than most Arab countries.

Nevertheless, no American or European on the face of this Earth could force a Palestinian leader to sign a peace treaty with Israel that would be rejected by an overwhelming majority of his people.

Trump’s “ultimate solution” may result in some Arab countries signing peace treaties with Israel. These countries anyway have no real conflict with Israel. Why should there not be peace between Israel and Kuwait? Why should there not be peace between Israel and Oman? Do any of the Arab countries have a territorial dispute with Israel? The only “problem” the Arab countries have with Israel is the one concerning the Palestinians.

For now, it appears that the vast majority of Arab regimes no longer care about the Palestinians and their leaders. The Palestinians despise the Arab leaders as much as they despise each other. It is a mutual feeling. The Palestinians particularly despise any Arab leader who is aligned with the US. They do not consider the US an honest broker in the Israeli-Arab conflict. The Palestinians, in fact, view the US as being “biased” in favor of Israel, regardless of whether the man sitting in the Oval Office is a Democrat or Republican.

The Saudi crown prince is viewed by Palestinians as a US ally. His close relations with Jared Kushner are seen with suspicion not only by Palestinians, but by many other Arabs as well. Palestinian political analysts such as Faisal Abu Khadra believe that the Palestinian leadership should prepare itself to face the “mysterious” Trump “peace plan.” They are skeptical that the plan would meet the demands of the Palestinians.

The Palestinians appear to be united in rejecting the Trump Administration’s effort to “impose” a solution on them. They are convinced that the Americans, with the help of Saudi Arabia and some Arab countries, are working towards “liquidating” the Palestinian cause. Abbas and his rivals in Hamas now find themselves dreading the US administration’s “peace plan.”

Like lemmings drawn to the sea, the Palestinians seem to be marching towards yet another scenario where they “never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.” The question remains: how will the Saudis and the rest of the international community respond to ongoing Palestinian rejectionism and intransigence?

Bassam Tawil, a Muslim, is based in the Middle East.

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Not Satire | Penn State Greens: Israeli Tree Planting is Environmental Racism

Posted November 13, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Academia and antisemitism, Academia and Palestinians,  Jewish National Fund, Environmental racism, Fossil Free Penn, Israel and planting trees, Penn State
Tags: , , , , , ,

Penn State Greens: Israeli Tree Planting is Environmental Racism, Watts up with That, , November 13, 2017

h/t Nick – If there was one Israeli initiative you would think radical greens would support, that would be Israeli efforts to restore ancient forests and improve national CO2 sequestration with a massive tree planting programme.

But no – according to Penn State Student organization “Fossil Free Penn”, the tree planting initiative is environmental racism.

Penn Students Hold Presentation on Environmental Racism

By Daniel Tancredi

The student group Fossil Free Penn held a discussion on environmental racism as part of its weeklong engagement project called “Divestfest” Wednesday afternoon.

…

In discussing environmental racism, the speakers highlighted the Israel-Palestine conflict. The Jewish National Fund, an organization that plants trees in Israel, was a major subject of discussion. After asserting that the organization acted unjustly by purchasing land from Palestinians in the early 1900s in deals from which the Palestinians did not profit, the presenters looked into the symbolism of “making the desert bloom,” a phrase the students argued connected the forest environment to whiteness, evoked the notion of “a vacuum that the European savior can come nourish,” and ultimately incentivized “artificially making these areas look more like Europe.”

The students found a particular problem in the planting of pine trees in Israel and the West Bank, drawing a “connection between pine trees, forestation, and the way they further the colonialist agenda through capitalistic (sic) means of timber production.”

While pine trees are an invasive species and can be bad for certain environments, the solution is not merely to plant native trees like the olive tree.

“If we are talking about environmental justice, we have to consider intersectionality,” one of the presenters said. “We have to consider the way that different environmental agendas are being used in order to romanticize and support things that may be in violation of human rights and ancestry rights.” Additionally, the students urged the audience to “look for the complexity in the way that issues are whitewashed.”

…

Read more: https://statesmanonline.org/2017/11/03/students-hold-presentation-on-environmental-racism/

Penn State, the place where your kids can learn from greens that planting trees is wrong, unless they are planted by people with a politically acceptable pedigree.

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‘Don’t you dare’

Posted November 13, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Hamas, Hamas - Palestinian Authority reconciliation, IDF, Islamic Jihad, Israeli security
Tags: , , , ,

‘Don’t you dare’ Israel Hayom, Yoav Limor, November 13, 2017

Now the message to Gaza is “no more.” Israel will not be a passive player, rather an active one that if attacked – will attack back. If Islamic Jihad considered a limited retaliation, one that would not lead to an escalation of hostilities, Israel is saying that its reaction will be severe regardless. It will not only target Islamic Jihad but the ruling faction in Gaza: Hamas.

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The unusual announcement from Maj. Gen. Yoav Mordechai, head of the Coordinator for Government Activities in the Territories unit, Saturday night was not out of the blue. In Israel, defense officials believe Palestinian Islamic Jihad is preparing a revenge attack for the demolition of its underground tunnel and deaths of its people.

This assessment was enough for Mordechai to leave his home Saturday evening, put on his uniform, and drive to IDF headquarters in Tel Aviv to record an announcement in Arabic, the gist of which can be summarized in three simple words: Don’t you dare.

During the 69 seconds in which he spoke, Mordechai sought to transfer the dilemma to the other side. Ever since the tunnel was destroyed, some two weeks ago, Israel has been on high alert; its military activity along the security fence has been minimal, agricultural work in the vicinity has been greatly restricted, and the message received by the Gaza was that Israel was waiting for a retaliation.

Now the message to Gaza is “no more.” Israel will not be a passive player, rather an active one that if attacked – will attack back. If Islamic Jihad considered a limited retaliation, one that would not lead to an escalation of hostilities, Israel is saying that its reaction will be severe regardless. It will not only target Islamic Jihad but the ruling faction in Gaza: Hamas.

This purpose of this message was to pass the dilemma back to Gaza. It was meant for Hamas, which is taking great pains to restrain Islamic Jihad and has thus far managed to stop it from retaliating; and for Islamic Jihad itself – which was warned that a terrorist attack would bring disaster to the Gaza Strip and sabotage Palestinian reconciliation efforts (which Israel opposes but is presently seeking to utilize). As expected, Islamic Jihad responded with an aggressive message of its own, reiterating its intention to retaliate.

With that, it appears the group’s leadership in Gaza has yet to make that decision and is waiting for the green light from its military headquarters in Damascus, namely from Ramadan Salah and his second-in-command Ziad Nahala. This is also why Mordechai included in his statement a particularly undiplomatic message for the two, warning “there will be those who will be held responsible” for the consequences of a future attack.

In the meantime, there are no signs that Islamic Jihad is folding. If the prevailing assumption of a revenge attack materializes – which will lead to an assured Israeli response – we could find ourselves in a downward spiral that neither side wants.

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Iran-backed forces could be 3 miles from Israel under Syria deal

Posted November 13, 2017 by Peter Hofman
Categories: Uncategorized

Israel says agreement does not go far enough in moving Iran and affiliated militias away from Golan Heights border

By TOI staff Today, 12:59 pm

https://www.timesofisrael.com/iran-backed-forces-could-be-3-miles-from-israel-under-syria-deal-report/

Iranian-backed forces in Syria could be left as close as five kilometers to the Israeli border under the terms of a ceasefire agreement hammered out between the US, Russia, and Jordan, according to a report this week. Israel has indicated that it is unhappy with the terms of the agreement.

An Israeli official said that, under the deal, militias associated with Iran would be allowed to maintain positions as little as five to seven kilometers (3.1-4.3 miles) from the border in some areas, Reuters reported Monday.

In other areas, the Iranian-allied forces would be pulled back as far as 30 kilometers from the border, explained the official, who spoke with the news agency on condition of anonymity. The final arrangements will depend on the current positions held by rebel forces fighting against the Assad regime on the Syrian part of the Golan Heights.

According to media reports, the deal applies even to Iranian proxies fighting on behalf of Syrian President Bashar Assad’s regime.

Transportation and Intelligence Minister Yisrael Katz (Ohad Zweigenberg)

Israeli intelligence minister Yisrael Katz refused to confirm those details but Israeli authorities have indicated the agreement does not go far enough in moving Iran and affiliated militias away from the Israeli border.

“Even though we view favorably the agreement on the need to eliminate the foreign forces — namely, the Iranian forces, Hezbollah and the Shiite militias from the area — the test will be on the ground, not in words but in deeds. Israel has already made it clear that it shall not accept Iran and its affiliates and proxies basing themselves in Syria, which will be a permanent threat and a constant source of tension, friction and instability,” Katz said Monday.

Israel has lobbied against allowing Iran to maintain any foothold in Syria. On Saturday, Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman said Israel “will not allow the Shiite axis to be established in Syria as a base for action,” after new photos were published of a permanent Iranian base being built some 50 kilometers from the Israeli Golan Heights.

Tzachi Hanegbi (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

On Sunday, minister Tzachi Hanegbi said  the agreement “does not answer Israel’s unequivocal demands that there will be no developments that bring Iranian or Hezbollah forces closer to Israel’s border with Syria in the north.”

The Israeli official who spoke to Reuters said the deal is intended to keep rival Syrian factions from clashing with each other but will also control the presence of Iranian proxies.

The agreement, announced in a US-Russian statement Saturday, affirms a call for “the reduction, and ultimate elimination” of foreign fighters from southern Syria.

A tank flying the Hezbollah terror group’s flag is seen in the Qara area in Syria’s Qalamoun region on August 28, 2017.(AFP Photo/Louai Beshara)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has in the past voiced concerns over Iran’s plans to cement its presence in Syria, which, he has said, include the establishment of naval and air force bases.

Jordanian government spokesman Mohammad Momani confirmed Sunday no non-Syrian fighters would be allowed in the “de-escalation zone” under the agreement, which he said was built on a previous ceasefire reached in July.

He also said the deal was a “key step” in ending the fighting in Syria and would help lead to a political solution to the Syrian civil war, according to the country’s al-Ghad newspaper.

The reports on the new ceasefire agreement came after the BBC published satellite photos on Friday said to show the construction of a permanent Iranian military base in Syria.

According to the BBC report, the base is situated at a site used by the Syrian army near El-Kiswah, 14 kilometers (8 miles) south of Damascus, and 50 kilometers (30 miles) from the Israeli border.

Satellite image of alleged Iranian base in Syria from October 2017 (Airbus, Digital Globe and McKenzie Intelligence Services/BBC)

In July, the Times of London reported that Israel was pushing Russia and the US for an agreement that would prevent “Hezbollah or other Iranian-backed militias” from operating in the area, which would extend some 30 miles (48 kilometers) beyond the Israeli-Syrian border on the Golan Heights.

Hezbollah, the Lebanese terror group that acts as a proxy of Iran, has been fighting on behalf of the Syrian President Bashar Assad in his efforts to suppress a six-year long insurgency. Russia, an ally of both Syria and Iran, has also provided military assistance in the war.

In recent years there have been several airstrikes inside Syria, attributed to the Israel, that targeted alleged shipments of advanced weapons and rockets for Hezbollah. Israel has vowed to prevent the Shiite organization, which holds positions along Israel’s northern border with Lebanon, from obtaining game-changing weaponry.

In August Netanyahu met with Russian President Vladmir Putin in Sochi, Russia, and entreated him to curb Iranian military expansion in Syria.

On Friday Pravda reported that while Putin told Netanyahu at their talks that “Israel is also an important partner for Russia in the region,” he stressed that “Iran is Russia’s strategic ally in the Middle East” and declined to abandon Russia’s alliance with the Islamic Republic.

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