RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16763/western-sahara-showdown

Presently, the Polisario Front appears to be trying to create “facts on the ground” outside of any legal framework, presumably in the hope that the international community will view them as irreversible.

International help would be greatly appreciated to prevent this showdown in the Sahara from escalating further.

While much of the world was looking the other way, distracted by China’s coronavirus and its economic aftermath, a separatist militia group backed by Algeria, the Polisario Front, have been militarily exploiting the crisis.

For weeks, the Polisario Front have blocked the only road leading southward from Morocco to Mauritania in the buffer zone of Guerguerat. Currently, around 200 trucks find themselves stranded there, while UN peacekeepers (MINURSO), on whom Morocco relies to enforce the tense 30-year ceasefire, apparently feel overwhelmed.

Ever since Spain withdrew from its former colony in the Western Sahara in 1975, the Polisario Front have been trying to claim the territory, rich with phosphates and fishing rights, as an independent state for themselves. Since that time, however, Morocco has served as the sole sovereign, offering the Western Sahara autonomy but not independence.

Last week, on Thursday night, Morocco finally responded to the Polisario Front’s roadblock at Guerguerat by creating a security cordon and promising to “restore free circulation of civilian and commercial traffic” between Morocco and Mauritania — an act that the Polisario Front called a “provocation.”

The Polisario Front had announced the Monday before that any movement of troops by Morocco to the buffer zone area “will be considered as a flagrant aggression to which the Sahrawi [Polisario] side will respond vigorously in self-defence and to defend its national sovereignty. This will also mean the end of the ceasefire and the beginning of a new war across the region.”

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/11/austrias-kurz-and-germanys-merkel-collision-course-robert-spencer/

The German-language Austrian publication Kronen Zeitung reported Tuesday that Austria’s Chancellor Sebastian Kurz flew to Paris in order to “coordinate ‘on a European level’ with French President Emmanuel Macron on the ‘fight against political Islam.’” This coordination involved a video conference that included German Chancellor Angela Merkel, European Union Council President Charles Michel, European Commission President Angela von der Leyen, and Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte. They all “announced that they would join forces and reform the Schengen rules.” But like so many things, it all sounded great until one started to examine the details.

“More far-reaching measures must be taken so that we can live safely in Europe and defend our way of life,” said Kurz, and who could argue with that? “We are in constant danger,” Kurz added, and pointed out that the European Union was full of “ticking time bombs” that is, thousands of “foreign fighters.” No argument there, either. But what did he and his colleagues propose to do about it?

Initially it looked as if the Euro honchos were on the right track: Macron “suggested implementing measures that have already been planned and decided in the fight against political Islam, or accelerating their implementation.”

These would include not only “against hate propaganda on the Internet and a reform of the Schengen rules,” but also “the linking of common databases so that the security services of the individual states can work better together.” Macron declared: “It takes reforms to enjoy our freedom and security.”

Why yes, Mr. Macron, yes it does. But does Europe have the courage to implement the reforms that would genuinely protect Europeans from further jihad massacres, such as immigration restrictions from jihadi hotspots and strict enforcement of the principle of one law for all, which would be a direct challenge to Sharia enclaves? None of that appeared to be even on the table at this video conference.

All of us at Gatestone Institute mourn the untimely passing of Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks. He was an intellectual and spiritual giant of our generation and beyond. His reach was global and his message was for all faiths. He believed passionately in the Dignity of Difference and was the moral voice of our time.

Gatestone was immensely privileged to have hosted Rabbi Lord Sacks recently at its Zoom event on September 17th of this year. We did not know then that this would be his final speaking event anywhere. In tribute to his memory we invite you to listen here to his inspiring and meaningful last interview on his recently published book “Morality”.

His passing is an immeasurable loss. We will all miss his knowledge, his insight, and his deeply held belief that together we could all strive, in his words “to heal a fractured world”.

May his memory be a blessing.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16762/britain-totalitarianism

It has become an almost daily occurrence to find news stories of parents being ‘called out’ by their newly politicised children for expressing on social media ‘wrong’, ‘unwoke’ views, or of people being fired for something they may or may not have said years ago.

This sense of entitlement has come to characterise a group whose younger demographic seem to have no comprehension of the horrors of a war — or indeed, of many authentic hardships — in their own relatively comfortable lives.

This lack of respect for, or understanding of, history, along with an apparent need to invent, import, or re-animate grievances from the past, then lead these protestors to advocate inflicting what they decide is the appropriate revenge for a grievance on people who have had no part in causing it.

Tolerance is to be expected only from others…. One man’s freedom, it seems, has become another man’s cause for resentment.

The protestors’ dismissal of British heritage, a bid to ‘cancel’ history, appears a threat to the nation. We supposedly have nothing to be proud of. Our achievements have presumably been little more than the spoils of an evil, bigoted patriarchal system. These malcontents, by pledging allegiance to the Marxist architects of that narrative, not only insult the memory of those who have fought and died for the freedoms we now take for granted; they are also two-stepping towards totalitarianism.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16739/austria-hate-speech-law

Austria’s proposed law is modelled on Germany’s much criticized NetzDG law, also known as the censorship law, which came into effect in January 2018 and requires social media companies to delete or block any online unlawful content within 24 hours or 7 days at the most, or face fines of up to 50 million euros.

If the proposed law is passed, the freedom of speech of Austrians online will be subject to the arbitrary decisions of corporate entities, such as Twitter, Goggle and Facebook.

With Austria’s draft online hate speech law, yet another European country is taking another step towards making online censorship an institutionalized feature of European hate speech laws.

“We too often make bad laws with good intentions. Online platforms should not censor the freedom of expression,” said Chairman of the Senate Law Commission Philippe Bas after the decision of France’s Constitutional Council. It can only be hoped that European lawmakers eager to censor free speech online will heed the ruling of the French constitutional court.

The Austrian government has presented a draft online hate speech law, the Communication Platforms Act, which, if passed, will limit free speech in the country. The Austrian government writes in the introduction to its proposed law:

“The main reason for the development of this draft Act is the worrying development that the Internet and social media, in addition to the advantages that these new technologies and communication channels provide, have also established a new form of violence, and hate on the Internet is increasing in the form of insults, humiliation, false information and even threats of violence and death. The attacks are predominantly based on racist, xenophobic, misogynistic and homophobic motives. A comprehensive strategy and a set of measures are required that range from prevention to sanctions. This strategy is based on the two pillars of platform responsibility and victim protection, with the present draft Act relating to ensuring platform responsibility”.

https://www.nysun.com/foreign/and-now-brino-brexit-in-alas-name-only/91336/

News from Downing Street tonight — that prime ministerial chief adviser Dominic Cummings has left Downing Street — alarms friends of British liberty.

Mr. Cummings was the dynamo behind the “Vote Leave” campaign that saw Brexit triumph at the 2016 referendum. His indispensability is right up there with that of Nigel Farage of the United Kingdom Independence Party.

When he joined Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s team at No 10, Brexiteers took heart that not only was a friend of independence advising the premier, but an avowed enemy of the bureaucratic “deep state.” Expectations were high.

Then coronavirus struck Britain. Mr. Cummings, far from being a courageous voice of common sense, was instead credited with Mr. Johnson’s credulous concessions to a scientific community only too willing to assume responsibility for shuttering Britain’s economy.

Reports are that with Mr. Cummings’s departure go the “Vote Leave” coterie he brought with him into Downing Street. Their duties are to be assumed by allies of the prime minister’s left-liberal fiancée, Carrie Symonds, who has had tense relations with the tattered remnant of right-leaning policy wonks.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/11/london-mayor-its-never-been-harder-be-muslim-last-robert-spencer/

London Mayor Sadiq Khan has never had it this bad, and he wants you to know that it is all the fault of one Donald J. Trump, lately of Washington, D.C. You may find it hard to believe that a President of the United States – any President of the United States – could so haunt the nightmares of the chief executive of a large and venerable city in another country, but that’s just because even after these past four years, you still haven’t fully grasped just how Bad this Orange Man really is. But you may be able to get a note excusing you from the next Truth and Reconciliation Commission meeting if you take some time now to understand how Sadiq Khan has suffered.

The UK’s LBC revealed Monday that “London Mayor Sadiq Khan has told LBC he was singled out by the now-outgoing US President Donald Trump ‘for no other reason’ than being Muslim.” How had the sinister Trump singled out Khan, you ask? Did he spy upon him? Did he try to frame him for crimes that would get him impeached and removed from office? No, none of that. Khan complained that Trump had put him under an “astonishingly ugly spotlight.”

This spotlight just added to Khan’s troubles: despite being Mayor of London and one of the most prominent politicians in Britain, he still suffered for his religious faith. “Being a Muslim ain’t easy, it isn’t easy,” Khan lamented, adding “it’s never been harder to be a Muslim than the last four years.”

Never, in 1,400 years of Islam! Wow! Not when the Muslims were expelled from Spain! Not when the State of Israel was founded, which supporters of the Palestinian jihad will tell you was the worst day in human history! No, for Khan it has never been worse than it is now, not because of China’s persecution of the Uighurs, but because of the evil Mr. Trump. For now, Khan said, the world had “for the first time the leader of the free world, a mainstream politician perpetuating a view that Islam and the West are incompatible.”

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16734/westerners-appeasing-islamists

“Political Islamic organizations are the reason for perpetuating terrorism and hatred. These organizations are banned in most of the Islamic countries, while Europe, especially Britain, embraces them and allows them to operate freely. Europeans can only blame themselves.” — Mohammed al-Sheikh, Saudi writer, Twitter, October 29, 2020.

“There is no doubt that France’s previous policies, lenient with [Muslim] extremists, contributed to the current wave of terrorism, as well as legislation that guarantees the right to asylum and immigration to every expatriate on its soil.” — Hailah al-Mashouh, Saudi columnist and political analyst, Elaph, November 5, 2020.

The group [Muslim World League] warned that Islamists have succeeded in implementing their political projects in non-Muslim countries under the umbrella of training mosque preachers and funding Islamic charities.

We are now seeing a large number of Arabs and Muslims warning about the clear and present danger Islamism poses to many different societies. These individuals are demonstrating courage and conviction in taking this public stance. Their advice, that Western states must eradicate Islamist organizations in Europe, is vitally important.

The recent terrorist attacks carried out by Muslims in France and Austria should serve as a warning to Europeans who have long been appeasing and endorsing extremist Muslim politicians and organizations.

This warning was sounded in the past few weeks by a growing number of writers, political analysts and politicians in Arab and Islamic countries. The main message they are sending to the Europeans: Political Islam is a threat not only to non-Muslims, but to Muslims and Arabs as well. Europeans need to wake up and start confronting the Muslim extremists.

“Political Islam organizations are the reason for spreading hatred and terrorism in the world,” said Saudi writer Mohammed al-Sheikh.

“Political Islamic organizations are the reason for perpetuating terrorism and hatred. These organizations are banned in most of the Islamic countries, while Europe, especially Britain, embraces them and allows them to operate freely. Europeans can only blame themselves.”