RUTHFULLY YOURS

“Has any soldier who fought FOR Canada ever received as generous a reward as this soldier who fought against us?” — Canadian Senator Linda Frum.

In 2003, Khadr confessed to throwing the grenade that killed U.S. Special Forces Sgt. 1st Class Christopher Speer and caused Sgt. 1st Class Layne Morris to lose an eye. Years later, he retracted his confession, claiming it had been extracted under duress. In fact, it was part of a plea deal that enabled him to be extradited to Canada to serve the rest of his sentence there.

“There was a Canadian flag flying along with the American flag at our base there, so it’s quite a thing that now Canada is giving millions to a guy who would attack a compound where Canadians were serving. I don’t see this as anything but treason. As far as I am concerned, Prime Minister Trudeau should be charged.” — Sgt. 1st Class Layne Morris, who lost an eye from the grenade thrown by Omar Khadr.

The government of Canada recently issued an official apology — and acknowledged awarding an “undisclosed” sum of money — to Toronto-born Islamist terrorist Omar Khadr for his “ordeal” at the U.S. military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and “any resulting harm” he was caused by the “torture” (specifically, sleep deprivation, solitary confinement and threats) that led to his confession.

On July 7, Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland and Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Ralph Goodale released a statement announcing the “hope that this expression, and the negotiated settlement reached with the Government, will assist him in his efforts to begin a new and hopeful chapter in his life with his fellow Canadians.”

The civil settlement was reached with Khadr, 30, who was 10 when his family returned to the Middle East, and 15 when he was arrested fighting in Afghanistan with al Qaeda and the Taliban, the terrorist organizations to which his father was affiliated — on the basis of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

In 2003, Khadr confessed to throwing the grenade that killed U.S. Special Forces Sgt. 1st Class Christopher Speer and caused Sgt. 1st Class Layne Morris to lose an eye. Years later, he retracted his confession, claiming it had been extracted under duress. In fact, it was part of a plea deal that enabled him to be extradited to Canada to serve the rest of his sentence there.

With news of the large settlement he received — 10,500,000 Canadian dollars (approximately USD $8,000,000) — he gave an extensive interview to CBC’s Power & Politics host Rosemary Barton, in which he said he thinks that the apology from the Canadian government “restores a little bit my reputation here in Canada, and I think that’s the biggest thing for me.” He declined to comment on having just received multi-millions in tax-free dollars.

He also had the effrontery to say that he just wants “to be a normal person” and finish his nursing degree to help under-served communities. “I have a lot of experience with… and appreciation of pain,” he explained, expressing only sorrow that the Speer and Morris families consider him responsible for their own pain.

Amid harsh criticism against the Liberal government by opposition Conservatives and members of the public outraged that their tax dollars are going to a convicted terrorist, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau responded to reporters’ questions on the matter during a press conference marking the July 8 close of G20 summit in Hamburg.

Trudeau said that the settlement had nothing to do with Khadr’s 2002 actions on the battlefield in Afghanistan, but rather with the fact that his rights had been violated. This is precisely what the Canadian Supreme Court ruled in 2008 and 2010, after Khadr’s lawyers sued for damages.

Trudeau added that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms protects all Canadians, “even when it is uncomfortable. When the government violates any Canadian’s Charter rights, we all end up paying for it.”

Meanwhile, Goodale tried to evade responsibility, by casting aspersions on the previous government, headed by Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper, in power when Khadr was returned to Canada in 2012 to serve the remainder of his prison sentence for five counts of war crimes. Goodale accused Harper of having “refused to repatriate Mr. Khadr or otherwise resolve the matter.”

Yesterday the world lost a hero of liberty and freedom. Liu Xiaobo, a voice for the voiceless and a defender of the oppressed in Communist China, passed away. Although the physical cause of his death was cancer, Dr. Liu’s primary battle was one of the soul. Ever since leaving the safety and comfort of America to lead the protests at Tiananmen Square in 1989, Dr. Liu sealed his fate as a persistent focus of persecution from the authoritarian PRC. From “reeducation through labor” and deprivation of property to unjust imprisonment and physical abuse, Dr. Liu bore the brunt of the Communist Party’s wrath for daring to challenge their system of political oppression by coauthoring of “Charter 08,” a manifesto of Chinese freedom that reverberates today more than ever.

Before his soul passed on from this world, Dr. Liu had one dying wish: to spend his final days with his wife Liu Xia in America. International physicians, including one from the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, attested that Dr. Liu was fit to travel if released immediately. One man stood in the way of this final request: Xi Jinping. China has been known in select circumstances to release wrongfully imprisoned foreigners, and even the North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un allowed Otto Warmbier to spend his final hours with his family. But something about Liu Xiaobo seemed particularly threatening to Xi and the apparatchiks in the Chinese Politburo. Perhaps it was his dignified commitment to speaking the truth about their regime in the face of every attempt on their part to silence him, something that Beijing has been so successful in doing with tens of millions of others since the founding of the PRC.

Although prevented from doing so during his 2009 sentencing, Liu Xiaobo was prepared to defend himself by claiming that “I have no enemies.” The power of nonviolent resistance has shown through the passing of time to strike terror into the heart of oppression, as evidenced by heroes Martin Luther King Jr. and Gandhi. Today, Liu Xiaobo joins their ranks. And in this, Xi Jinping’s worst fear has become reality: Dr. Liu’s spirit and bravery in life will endure as an inspiration to the countrymen he so desperately sought to liberate. His dream of a free, democratic China will persist. Although Xi has aligned himself with the ignominious and shameful company of dictators who imprisoned and killed Nobel laureates — and there are few in number — Liu Xiaobo’s dream will live on, and the United States must do everything in its power to ensure that it never perishes. Far from being an act of strength or defiance, Xi’s decision shows the weakness and fear of an increasingly cynical, technocratic, and frightened authoritarian clique.

As we grieve his loss, our immediate focus must be his widow Liu Xia. Because Xi Jinping refused their departure to America, their rightfully earned Nobel-prize money remains unclaimed, and Liu Xia is in danger. Although it is of no consolation regarding the death of her husband, I was pleased to hear yesterday from Liu Xiaobo’s counsel that the Norwegian Nobel Institute has now confirmed that it has found a legal way for Liu Xia to be able to inherit the $1.5 million monetary award for the Nobel Peace Prize that Liu Xiaobo was never able to collect. I intend to continue my longstanding effort to honor Liu Xiaobo and to secure Liu Xia’s livelihood, and I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, Republican and Democrat: If there is a cause that should unite us all, it is that the wife a Nobel Peace laureate speaking out for peace and democracy should not be kept hostage in Communist China.

— Ted Cruz is a U.S. senator from Texas.

One of the hallmarks of jihadists is their grotesque savagery against women. The classic Hollywood picture of a jihadist as a pure, pious young Muslim man is largely nonsense. The reality is far more brutish. The tales of sex slavery in ISIS-held Iraq and Syria should chill thinking people to the bone. During my own time in Iraq, al-Qaeda terrorists were known for systematically raping women as part of an effort to shame them into becoming suicide bombers. After brutal gang rapes, they were told that the only way they could “redeem” their allegedly lost honor was to strap a bomb on their broken bodies and blow themselves up at restaurants, checkpoints, and hospitals. It was pure evil.

Also striking was the nonchalance and fearlessness of the most hardened jihadists after their capture by Americans. By the end of my deployment, I could almost predict whether we’d snagged a committed jihadist by his attitude in detention. Al-Qaeda leaders would often laugh, act like they were on vacation, and sometimes attempt to engage their captors in casual conversation. I’ll never forget the arrogant confidence of an Oxford English-speaking leader of an al-Qaeda rape ring. They knew they were safe, and they gloried in their invulnerability.

It’s against this backdrop — savage treatment of women and contempt for Western justice — that I read with alarm a stunning report on “Europe’s Afghan crime wave.” The piece is notable not just for its content, but for its author. Cheryl Benard has worked sympathetically with refugees and was a subject-matter expert at the RAND corporation. In other words, this piece isn’t from the anti-Muslim fever swamps but from the heart of the elite national-security establishment. Her thesis is simple: European nations are grappling with a wave of vicious immigrant attacks against women, and the attackers are coming disproportionately from Afghanistan.

The stories are horrifying, sometimes involving attacks in broad daylight and in public spaces like parks, trains, and train stations. Read these stories and try to imagine them happening here:

In one recent case that raised a huge public outcry, a woman was out for a walk in a park on an elevation above the Danube. With her she had her two children, a toddler plus her infant in a baby carriage. Out of the blue, an Afghan refugee leapt at her, threw her down, bit her, strangled her and attempted to rape her. In the struggle, the baby carriage went careening towards the embankment and the infant almost plunged into the river below. With her second child looking on aghast, the woman valiantly fought off her assailant, ripping the hood off his jacket, which later made it possible for an Austrian police dog to track him down.