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2016

The ‘Unholy Alliance’ Comes to Campus How the BDS Movement turns left-wing students into Jew-haters. Sara Dogan

Conservative author David Horowitz has long written about the “Unholy Alliance” that exists between Islamic extremists and the American Left. Now, a new series of photographs of campus propaganda posters reveals how this unholy alliance plays out on American campuses where students are incited to join the Islamic war against the Jews of Israel with appeals to their sense of “social justice” and desire to address historic wrongs such as racism, colonialism and the mistreatment of women.

Many naïve Jewish students are seduced into joining these anti-Israel coalitions out of a desire to help the oppressed but find themselves ensnared in a Hamas-directed campaign to commit genocide against the Jews themselves.

Campus leaders of the Hamas campaign are two groups: Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), as well as its less outwardly political counterpart, the Muslim Students Association (MSA). Both were created by members of the Muslim Brotherhood, whose spiritual leader Yousef al-Qaradawi has called on Muslims to finish the job that Hitler started. The Brotherhood is godfather to the anti-Israel terror group Hamas, whose charter calls for the extermination of the Jews. SJP and MSA conduct annual anti-Israel hate-fests known as “Israeli Apartheid Weeks” during which they erect mock “apartheid walls” plastered with Hamas propaganda, including claims that Israel is an “apartheid” state which seeks to shed the blood of Palestinian children. A near-omnipresent image on these walls is a series of four false and genocidal maps purporting to show the Jewish infiltration and colonization of the Arab nation of “Palestine” from 1947 to the present.

Democrats Blocked Bush Judicial Nominee for Entire Presidential Term Daniel Greenfield

When the left sputters about the importance of getting a prompt vote on an Obama nominee, let’s just remind them about Judge Priscilla Owen.

Owen was a moderate and she was highly rated. She was also no Alito, Bork or Thomas. But when she was nominated for the Fifth Circuit in the spring of ’01, Senate Democrats denied her a vote for four years until the spring of ’05. When the vote finally came up, Obama voted against her.

That’s the length of an entire presidential term. This wasn’t running out the clock on a lame duck presidency. Senate Democrats refused the “up and down vote” they’re demanding to a nominee for 4 years. They filibustered her and threw tantrums that would have embarrassed a six-year-old.

Both Owen and Estrada were originally nominated by President Bush May 9, 2001.

“They have been waiting almost two years for a vote,” White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said May 1 before the vote. “Both were rated ‘well-qualified’ by the American Bar Association. That is the highest possible rating that the American Bar Association gives. It is also, according to Democrats, the gold standard that they would use to judge whether nominees were qualified.”

Democrats also are subverting “the spoken will of the people,” Land said, noting that voters gave President Bush “an unprecedented mid-term gain in the Senate and the House” in 2002.

Instead of “bowing to the clearly expressed will of the people,” Land said, the Democrats have “carried their obstructionist tactics to new lows.”

And what crime did Owen commit?

Owen is a 10-year veteran of the Texas Supreme Court who won her last re-election campaign with 84 percent of the vote. When Bush nominated her for the federal bench, the American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary unanimously gave her its highest rating.

Israel’s Dangerous Consensus 99% of Mossad and Shin Bet officers are leftists? Caroline Glick

Recently I found myself in a chance conversation with a former head of the Mossad’s Directorate of Operations. The former master spy, whom I had never met before, knew that I am a journalist.

He was aware of my political views.

Directing his remarks at a friend of mine, he declared that 99 percent of Mossad and Shin Bet officers are leftists. He then added triumphantly that according to a former commander of the air force whose name he cited, 99% of the air force’s pilots are similarly leftists.

Initially, I dismissed his comments as obnoxious chest-beating by a man who felt like irritating a group of right-wingers.

But given the source, it is impossible to simply brush off what he said. And to be clear, far more troubling than the prospect that Israel’s security establishment is uniformly leftist is the notion that there is any intellectual or ideological uniformity of any kind in the ranks of our defense community.

But given our defense community’s record in recent years, there is ample reason to believe that there is more than a grain of salt in the spy chief’s boast.

Consider Israel’s handling of Gaza.

According to a number of senior officers, at the end of Operation Protective Edge in 2014, the IDF’s senior commanders convened in Tel Aviv to determine how to handle the Hamas regime going forward.

During Protective Edge, Israel learned a few things about Hamas and about the strategic balance of power between Israel and Hamas in the region and the world.

On the ground Israel learned that Hamas bases its offensive capabilities on civilian infrastructure.

Hamas placed its missiles, its communications centers and its operational commands inside civilian buildings including private homes, hospitals, clinics, schools, mosques and UN offices.

As far as the strategic balance and resources of both sides, during the war Hamas enjoyed the de facto backing of the Obama administration.

Throughout the war, the administration pressured Israel to accept Hamas’s cease-fire terms as dictated by its state sponsors Qatar and Turkey.

On the other hand, Israel was able to avoid bowing to the US’s pro-Hamas demands because throughout the conflict we enjoyed the open support of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

In other words, during the war, Israel discovered that Hamas’s military strategy was based entirely on an implicit alliance with the West, which attacked Israel for targeting Hamas’s military infrastructure, which, again, was all based in civilian structures.

How Obama Denied Conservative Judges a Vote Conservative nominees were blocked from 4 to 6 years Daniel Greenfield

On a hot day in June, the grandson of a bank president took to the floor of the Senate to denounce the daughter of sharecroppers. “I feel compelled to rise on this issue to express, in the strongest terms, my opposition to the nomination of Janice Rogers Brown to the DC Circuit,” Senator Obama said.

Born in segregated Alabama, Janice Rogers Brown had been a leftist like Obama before becoming conservative. When Obama rose to denounce the respected African-American jurist for her political views it had been almost a full two years since President Bush had nominated her in the summer of ’03.

Obama had arrived a few months earlier on his way to the White House and was eager to impress his left-wing backers with his political radicalism. He held forth complaining that Judge Janice Rogers Brown, who had gone to segregated schools and become the first African-American woman on the California Supreme Court, was guilty of “an unyielding belief in an unfettered free market.”

And he filibustered Judge Brown, along with other nominee, trying to deny them a vote.

“She has equated altruism with communism. She equates even the most modest efforts to level life’s playing field with somehow inhibiting our liberty,” he fumed.

Brown, who due to her family background knew far more of slavery than Obama, had indeed warned about the dangers of a powerful government. “In the heyday of liberal democracy, all roads lead to slavery. And we no longer find slavery abhorrent. We embrace it. We demand more. Big government is not just the opiate of the masses. It is the opiate — the drug of choice — for multinational corporations and single moms, for regulated industries and rugged Midwestern farmers and militant senior citizens.”

Obama’s Syria Non-Strategy is Imploding : Fred Fleitz

Secretary of State John Kerry got the headline he was looking for last week when the press reported that the United States and Russia agreed on a cease-fire in Syria that would allow the delivery of food and humanitarian aid.

Kerry actually said a “cessation of hostilities” had been agreed to, not a cease-fire. Kerry also referred to this development as a “pause” in hostilities that would begin in one week “after consultations with Syrian parties.”

Kerry’s careful wording reflected the reality that the Syrian government and Syrian rebels have yet to accept this agreement. Kerry also omitted another glaring problem with this so-called cessation of hostilities: it will not apply to Russian air strikes.

The reason for this is that the agreement excludes attacks on ISIS and the al Qaeda-backed al-Nusra Front because they are terrorist groups. Russia is using this exception to justify continuing its bombing of other Syrian rebel groups by falsely claiming they are terrorists.

President Obama objected to Russia’s position by issuing a statement on Sunday calling on Moscow to cease “its air campaign against moderate opposition forces in Syria.”

The cease-fire agreement was the latest in a series of diplomatic initiatives by the Obama administration to make it appear that it is doing something about the Syria crisis. The agreement was in response to the stalled peace process begun by Kerry last fall that produced a vague outline for peace talks. This outline called for a peace process that would lead to “credible, inclusive, non-sectarian governance, followed by a new constitution and elections” to be administered under UN supervision.” It also was agreed that formal peace talks under UN auspices would begin on January 1st.

The peace talks outline left several major issues unresolved. There was no agreement on a cease-fire or the political future of Syrian President Assad. There also were disagreements over which groups would be designated terrorists and disallowed from attending the talks.

Instead of moving toward a peaceful resolution after the November peace outline, Russia and Syria intensified hostilities. Aided by Russian bombers and Iranian fighters, the Syrian army last month began an assault on the rebel stronghold of Aleppo, causing an exodus of 50,000 refugees. The residents of several rebel towns are facing starvation because of a new Syrian army strategy called “surround and starve.”

The Dangerous Hope of Two-Staters by Barry Shaw

I am in bewilderment of those who have made a fifty year career, costing billions of dollars, in pursuit of an elusive Two-State Solution.

Personal disclosure. I was a member of this cult until the harsh reality of truth hit my hometown of Netanya in the form of post-Oslo Accord, Arafat-inspired, Palestinian terrorism.

I was fortunate. I was hit with a psychological smack in the head. I got off easily. Too many of our citizens were killed or badly injured by the incessant suicide bombings, car bombs and shootings that only stopped by Operation Defensive Shield which targeted the terrorist cells under Palestinian control.

It is shocking how persistent people are to pursue this Two-State Solution as if it is the only oasis in a barren, arid, desert. But this fifty year trek toward a shimmering distant mirage draws sloggers toward an unreachable goal. Had they looked left or right they may have discovered alternative routes to peace, rather than doggedly plod toward a fantasy.

Way back in January 1988, a New York Times article stated that “Gaza could be the Singapore of the Middle East.” So it could if Gazan Arabs weren’t so passionately and religiously bound to Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The twisted tribal code of Arab honor leaves them with a sense of shame and inferiority when Israeli cooperation and assistance is offered to them. Rather than benefit and prosper they grudgingly accept largesse while plotting to chop off the hand extended to them in peace. The resentment can be seen in the ‘anti-normalization’ campaigning of BDS activists encouraged by a large segment of the Palestinian leadership.

Truth be told, the signs were there for all to see decades ago. Resear

The president doesn’t deserve an EZ-pass in replacing Scalia by Betsy McCaughey

Democrats are giddy over the prospect of President Obama replacing conservative Justice Antonin Scalia with a liberal.

But Republicans are equally adamant about blocking Obama’s lame-duck appointment. “This vacancy should not be filled until we have a new president,” says Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

It’s rare that a president makes a Supreme Court appointment during his last months in office. But timing’s not the critical issue. The real outrage is the Democrats’ baseless claim that Obama’s promised nominee should have an automatic green light to the bench.

Party chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz urged the Senate to move quickly, “as our founders intended,” and not be “twisted by politics.”

Hillary Clinton says any obstruction would “dishonor our Constitution.” Sorry, that’s not what the Constitution says.

Democratic presidential contender Bernie Sanders also insists it would be wrong to delay Obama’s court pick for “overtly political reasons.”

All these politicians need a history lesson. Claiming the Senate’s duty is to rubber stamp any “qualified” nominee is pure fiction.

Whaddya Know: Trump Did Support Invading Iraq By Stephen Kruiser

Surprise! Or not.

For months, Donald Trump has claimed that he opposed the Iraq War before the invasion began — as an example of his great judgment on foreign policy issues.

But in a 2002 interview with Howard Stern, Donald Trump said he supported an Iraq invasion.

In the interview, which took place on Sept. 11, 2002, Stern asked Trump directly if he was for invading Iraq.

“Yeah I guess so,” Trump responded. “I wish the first time it was done correctly.”

Trump has repeatedly claimed that he was against the Iraq War before it began, despite no evidence of him publicly stating this position. On Meet the Press, Trump said there weren’t many articles about his opposition because he wasn’t a politician at the time.

“Well, I did it in 2003, I said it before that,” Trump said of his opposition to invading Iraq. “Don’t forget, I wasn’t a politician. So people didn’t write everything I said. I was a businessperson. I was, as they say, a world-class businessperson. I built a great company, I employed thousands of people. So I’m not a politician. But if you look at 2003, there are articles. If you look in 2004, there are articles.”

Trump’s comments on Stern are more in line with what he wrote in his 2000 book, The America We Deserve, where he advocated for a “principled and tough” policy toward “outlaw” states like Iraq.

Suicidal Overcompensation in Germany By James Lewis

Back in the days when Garrison Keillor was still funny, he told stories about the pioneering settlers who founded Lake Woebegon, Minnesota in the 19th century. In the story, Norwegian immigrants settled in the coldest part of Minnesota because it reminded them of home – and then, when winter came, they remembered why they had left there in the first place. German Catholics wandered into Lake Woebegon by mistake, “but they refused to admit it.”

So they stayed.

Today, Angela Merkel’s Germany is making another suicidal gesture by opening the borders to tens of thousands of predatory, war-indoctrinated jihadis – young men of military age, who have been taught to despise, hate, and beat up anybody outside their own Muslim sect. They are indoctrinated in war theology – the last major war theology on Earth. Merkel and the EU have drifted into this suicidal fiasco by mistake – but they still refuse to admit it.

It’s the German Catholics and Lake Woebegon again. Sweden and Germany (especially Prussia) have a long folk reputation for getting completely stuck in whatever the current absolutist ideology happens to be. This kind of fanatical belief led to centuries of bloody warfare between German-speaking Lutherans and Catholics. Then it was Prussian imperialism with Frederick the Great and later Bismarck, who turned the independent provinces of Germany into one unified and self-glorifying Reich. Prussian egomania turned into Karl Marx’s “philosophy” and Richard Wagner’s ideology in 1848; Marx preached revolutionary terror, and Wagner led directly to Hitler. But the absolutist pathology over there was still the same. Only the slogans changed.

Today Angela Merkel and the EU preach peace, peace, but they stupidly let in 50 million easily indoctrinated Muslims – so there will be no peace. Isaiah (48:22) was right again. The Swedes, Germans, and French still yearn for that Napoleonic absolutism, and the EU is always frantically denying that it plans to become another Roman Empire.

Tony Thomas Neutering the Army’s ‘Warrior Culture’

De-gendering society inspires shrieking enthusiasm in womyn’s studies classrooms, where academic notions of equality make minimal contact with the real world. In a foxhole things are different, which explains why the feminist push to “reform” the armed forces is so very worrying
In an epochal change in late 2011, Labor’s Defence Minister Stephen Smith announced that virtually all remaining military restrictions on women in combat would be lifted before 2016. Women in the Australian Defence Force (ADF) are now available to kill or be killed at the bleeding edge

This followed the ADF’s own announcement in April, 2011, to the same effect. Those signing off on it were General David Hurley, Chief of the Defence Force; Navy chief Vice-Admiral Ray Griggs; Army chief Lt-Gen David Morrison (current Australian of the Year); Air Force chief Air Marshall Geoff Brown; and Major-General Gerard Fogarty, Head, People Capability. Hurley began it:

After thirty-five years in the Infantry, I know the rigours of life as an infantryman. My decision to support the opening of combat positions in the Australian Defence Force (ADF) to women comes from experience and knowledge … A robust and agile ADF relies on every member having the opportunity to contribute fully and equally to Defence operations and capability.

We all share the responsibility to work towards a fair, just and inclusive ADF. After all, gender equality is the whole community’s responsibility.

The statement was emphatic that standards would not be lowered for women’s entry. It was accompanied by a “Risk Management Plan” of high formality but little substance (maybe the nitty-gritty details are for military-eyes only). Meanwhile, Defence got a new employee, a “permanent full-time cultural change manager to assist with implementing cultural change within Army.”