RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://jonathanspyer.com/2020/06/01/a-new-alliance/ 

Turkey, Pakistan, Malaysia and Qatar form emergent power nexus in the Islamic World

The name of fugitive Indian Salafi Islamist preacher Zakir Naik is little known in the west. Naik, founder of the Mumbai-based Islamic Research foundation,  is currently being pursued by the Indian authorities on charges of money laundering and hate speech.  Naik is a popular Islamist preacher in his native country.  He has been referred to as ‘perhaps the most influential Salafi ideologue in India,’ and ‘the world’s leading Salafi evangelist.’  Naik’s views on such subjects as homosexuality, apostasy and the Jews are as might be expected (the first two deserve the death penalty, the third ‘control America.’)  The Indian authorities note evidence that two of the seven terrorists who carried out a deadly attack at a café in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on July 1, 2016, claimed inspiration from his teachings.

In himself, the fugitive preacher is of only passing interest.  Zakir Naik’s activities are worthy of further note, however, because the list of his supporters and their activities on his behalf cast light on an emergent nexus in the Islamic world deserving of greater attention.   This crystallising alliance looks set to be of considerable consequence in the period opening up, not least for Israel and some of its partners in the region and beyond.

Zakir Naik, fleeing from the Indian authorities, has been the lucky recipient of permanent resident status in Malaysia.  There, his case has become something of a cause celebre. The Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS), which has four ministers in the current government, is vociferously opposed to acceding to Indian calls for his extradition.

Reports in a number of Indian media outlets claim that the (unusual) granting of permanent residency to the fugitive preacher came as a result of a request from  the government of Pakistan. The reports further suggest that ‘Pakistan is also using its relations with…Turkey and Qatar to provide funding to Zakir Naik.’

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16082/china-what-we-must-do

The truth is that the United States is defending more than just its position in the international system. We are defending the international system itself, the system of treaties, conventions, rules, and norms.

Unfortunately, Xi Jinping, the Chinese ruler, does not believe in that system. He is trying to impose China’s imperial‑era notions of the world.

In short, Chinese rulers believed that they had the mandate of heaven over tianxia, meaning “all under heaven.” Recently, his pronouncements have become unmistakable.

In the last few months, Xi Jinping has seen an historic opportunity because the United States has been stricken by the disease that China itself has pushed out… What must we do? First, let us talk about what we must not do. We must not save Chinese communism again. In the past, American presidents, when China has been stressed, had ridden to the rescue of the Chinese state.

On May 13 of last year, Beijing declared a “people’s war” on the United States. This means the contest with China is existential. There is going to be one survivor. It is either going to be the Peoples’ Republic of China or the United States of America, but not both.

What should we do? In my call for action, there are eight items. First, we need to cut off trade with China. Now, I know a lot of people think we should not do this, or this would be unfortunate. Yes, this is unfortunate, but the point is that China’s communism cannot be reformed, so the only way we can protect American society and Americans is to reduce our exposure to China and our great exposure, of course, is trade… we should not be enriching a hostile state with the proceeds of commerce with the United States.

China’s Communist Party does not have sovereign immunity…. We have the Global Magnitsky Act.

We need to “rip and replace” all the equipment in our telecom backbone that has been supplied by Huawei Technologies… China has been using that company’s equipment to spy on others. We should have no Huawei equipment in our backbone

Also, we should be turfing out even more Chinese journalists. Those “journalists”… work for China’s intelligence services.

Unfortunately, China does not believe in comparative advantage, it does not believe in being a responsible member of the international community. Unfortunately, the only thing we can do is what many people think is unthinkable, and that is to cut our ties with China…. We cut our ties until… the Communist Party no longer rules [and] the Chinese people govern themselves…. I believe the Chinese people eventually will get this right.

China has attacked America with coronavirus. At this moment, more than 100,000 Americans have been killed. We brace ourselves for the deaths to come.

Today, I’ll do two things. First, I’ll talk about the nature of that attack. The second thing, what we must do to protect ourselves.

First of all, China is not, as many people will tell you, just a competitor. It is an enemy. China is trying to overthrow the international system, and in that process, it is trying to make you subject to modern-day Chinese emperors.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16081/white-house-iran-policy

Since President Trump was elected, and the US administration took a tougher stance towards the mullahs, Iran’s oil exports dropped to approximately 200,000 barrels per day — a number that represents a decline of more than 90%.

Now it is incumbent on other governments — specifically the European Union — to join the US in pursuing its (almost) “maximum pressure” policy against the ruling mullahs.

The policy may not be really “maximum” — everyone has carefully been tip-toeing around the words “regime change” — which, bluntly, would be a boon to (almost) everyone — but at least until then, sanctions are helping more than nothing, and definitely more than US pallets of cash.

Thanks to the re-imposition of sanctions against Tehran by the Trump administration, the Iranian regime seems to have suffered a significant loss of revenue.

The Trump administration’s (almost) “maximum pressure” policy against the Iranian regime is apparently forcing Tehran to rein in some of its forces in the region as well as cut funding to its allies.

According to the latest report, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has withdrawn some of its forces from Syria, and reduced its financial assistance to Syria’s regime.

The US special envoy for Syria policy and the fight against the Islamic State, James Jeffrey, recently pointed out:

“We have seen the Iranians pulling in some of their outlying activities and such in Syria because of, frankly, financial problems… the Trump administration’s sanctions policies against Iran [are] having a real effect in Syria.”

He added, “We do see some withdrawal of Iranian-commanded forces. Some of that is tactical because they are not fighting right now, but it also is a lack of money”.

Iran’s oil revenues and exports have been steadily declining since the US President Donald J. Trump pulled out of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) — also known as the Iran nuclear deal, and incidentally, never signed by Iran — and adopted a policy of (almost) “maximum pressure.”

https://dianebederman.com/why-didnt-nccm-jaffari-centre-explicitly-condemn-hate-s

On May 16 Firas (Hussaini) Al Najim is the co-manager of Canadian Defenders For Human Rights (CD4HR), a pro-Palestinian Canadian registered non for profit organization (NO.1067715-9) used a loudspeaker to recite the Islamic call to prayer (adhan) outside the Jaffari Islamic Centre located at 9000 Bathurst Street in Thornhill, ON. Al Najim shared antisemitic tropes, called Muslims to follow the religious duty of refraining from any business transaction with Zionists and called for the end of Israel.

He shared these thoughts in the middle of a diverse neighbourhood, including Jews with a nearby Yeshiva(religious school), You can read the entire speech here.

We are here today, it is May 16, 2020. It is Saturday and it is also the 23rd night of Ramadan. It is called the powerful night, Laylat al-Qadr. It is a very heavy night. It is a very powerful night. This night is a better than a thousand years. This is what the Quran says… We thank the City of Vaughan for giving the permission to call the prayer of adhan during this corona virus and the crisis that hits the global world. We want to speak also about an important fact. We need to pray for the Palestinian people in the holy land. And this centre here [Jaffari Islamic Centre], the majority of the followers, they follow Ali al-Husayni al-Sistani, Ayatollah al-Sistani… And he [Sistani] is totally against the occupation of Palestine, he [Sistani] is against the illegitimate Zionist regime. He [Sistani] calls for the liberation the holy Palestine and also for boycotting all the Zionist businesses. He said that it is illegal it is forbidden for any Muslim, especially the followers that follow him, to do any business transaction with any Zionist business.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16080/persecution-of-christians-april

“What is the crime of these innocent people against Fulani herdsmen?… For how long shall we continue to beg the government and the security agencies to come to the aid of our people?” — Local resident of one of the villages that was ravaged, Morningstar News, April 9, 2020, Nigeria.

“The insurgents have so far mainly targeted isolated villages, killing more than 900 people… The unrest has forced hundreds of thousands of locals to flee….” — The Guardian, April 22, 2020, Mozambique.

On April 21, Christian convert and human rights activist Mary Mohammadi was sentenced to three months in prison and flogging [10 lashes] — above and beyond what she had already experienced — due to her criticism of the regime’s violations against human rights…. During her hearing, the judge harassed her about her conversion to Christianity even though charges against her had nothing to do with religion. — The Christian Post, April 22, 2020, Iran.

As occurred during the height of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, “jihadist rebels” continue to confiscate Christian properties in the name of “sharia.” — Al Masdar News, April 25, 2020, Syria.

The following are among the abuses Muslims inflicted on Christians throughout the month of April 2020:

The Slaughter of Christians

Nigeria: The first two days of April opened with machete-wielding Muslim Fulani herdsmen murdered at least 13 Christians. “[W]e woke up to bury seven people burnt to death … from an overnight attack,” one source said. Those killed “are mostly elderly Christians who were unable to escape as members of the community ran into surrounding bushes during the attack.”

Then, on April 7, Muslim Fulani herdsmen slaughtered a pastor and three members of his congregation, including a 10-year-old boy. The pastor, Matthew Tagwai, who was murdered in his home, is survived by a pregnant wife and two small children.

On April 10, Muslim Fulani herdsmen murdered pastor Stephen Akpor, 55. “Two herdsmen came to a branch of our church, Celestial Church … where they shot him as he was praying and counseling five members in the church,” his colleagues said. “The herdsmen shot the pastor several times and then stabbed him to death.” He is survived by his wife and five children.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16077/china-mixed-signals

[I]t is clear that Beijing is frightened of the contagion of democracy not only from Hong Kong but also from Taiwan, which has shown that a highly prosperous and reasonably democratic “China” need not remain a pipedream.

Trouble is that the US does not have a coherent, strategically meaningful, policy towards China…. Imposing largely symbolic sanctions is like parking your car because you don’t know where you want to go.

Is China frightening or is it frightened?

An examination of decisions made in last week’s annual session of the National People’s Congress (NPC), reveals that she may be both. Or to put it another way, as on occasions in the past decades of Communist rule, China could become frightening because it is frightened.

Billed as a parliament in the Western media, the NPC is a strange beast.

It is certainly meant to approve draft laws submitted by the leadership and, in theory at least, could weigh on policy debates and act as watchdog over the general state of things in the People’s Republic.

However, equally certainly, it cannot be regarded as a parliament in the generally accepted sense of the term. Yet, it is not as some Sinpohobes assert, a mere rubber-stamp either. It may be a small aquarium compared to the huge ocean that is China, but it does provide an opportunity to see the fish allowed to swim in it, and to assert the size of each.

So what did the aquarium put on show this time?

https://besacenter.org/perspectives-papers/georgia-relations-israel-us/

In 1992, shortly after the fall of the Soviet Union, both the US and Israel established diplomatic relations with Georgia, which had been freed from the grip of the Soviet bloc and was setting out as an independent state. Between then and now, relations between the states have tightened in all areas: diplomacy, security, and trade.

Georgia’s relations with Israel have grown ever warmer since the establishment of diplomatic relations on June 1, 1992. The strength of the relationship was visible on August 10, 2008, when the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs published this unambiguous announcement regarding the Russian aggression toward Georgia: “Israel is following with great concern the developments in South Ossetia and Abkhazia and hopes the violence will end. Israel recognizes the territorial integrity of Georgia and calls for a peaceful solution.”

On August 15 of that year, a demonstration of support for Georgia was held in Tel Aviv at which Israelis formed a human chain and demanded that their government increase its support for Georgia. Similarly, on November 20, 2012, during the Pillar of Defense IDF operation in the Gaza Strip, there was a large demonstration in support of Israel in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi. In addition, Georgian television broadcast sympathetic news reports about Israel and distributed publicity brochures on Israel’s behalf in some schools.

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/swedens-covid-death-rate-now-ten-times-higher-than-norways/?utm_source=recirc-desktop&utm_medium=homepage&utm_

There have now been ten times as many COVID-19 deaths in Sweden than Norway on a per capita basis.

According to the Worldometers website, 435 out of every one million Swedes have died from the virus, while the virus has killed 44 out of every million Norwegians.

Norway imposed a lockdown to slow the spread of the coronavirus early on March 12, but the country reopened schools early in May. “Our goal is that by June 15 we will have reopened most of the things that were closed,” Norway’s prime minister said at a press conference earlier this month.

Its neighbor Sweden, by contrast, took a more lax approach: The government banned events with more than 50 people and shut down universities and secondary schools but imposed few other restrictions.

Swedish government officials said lockdowns could do little to save lives over the long term and that their more lax approach would let their society reach herd immunity more quickly and lessen the economic pain the country would endure. “About 30 percent of people in Stockholm have reached a level of immunity,” Karin Ulrika Olofsdotter, the Swedish ambassador to the United States, told NPR on April 26. “We could reach herd immunity in the capital as early as next month.”

https://justthenews.com/world/europe/denmark-finland-say-they-saw-no-increase-coronavirus-after-schools-re-opened

The Nordic countries of Denmark and Finland are reporting no increase in the spread of coronavirus since opening their respective schools, further suggesting that children are less likely to be sickened by COVID-19 and spread the virus. 

Denmark began sending its children back to school on April 15, just over a month after Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen issued an extensive nationwide lockdown. They were kept spaced apart in classrooms and on playgrounds, while sanitation measures such as hand-washing stations and deep-cleaning procedures were put into place. 

Similar measures were put into place in Finland to keep children from congregating in large groups. The country’s education minister, Li Andersson, predicted that reopening schools would “have a minimal impact on the pandemic, but grand benefits for children.”

Both countries say the pandemic has not spiked since schools re-opened. Cases and deaths in Denmark appear to have peaked in early April. Finland’s infection rate appears to have peaked around the same time, though its death rate remained almost entirely flat throughout the pandemic, aside from two one-day spikes late last month. 

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/05/killing-your-own-neighbors-uzay-bulut/

A Turkish pro-government writer recently threatened the political opposition in the country and her own neighbors with death on national TV.

On May 3, Sevda Noyan said on Ülke TV that in the event of a coup attempt, her family can kill at least fifty people, including some neighbors. She said she made a list of people to kill.

Referring to the events following the coup attempt on July 15, 2016, when many supporters of Turkey’s president Recep Tayyip Erdogan took to the streets upon the president’s call to defend the government, Noyan said:

“We couldn’t do what we exactly wanted [on July 15, 2016]. We got caught unprepared.

“Do not get it wrong; get it right,” she continued. “My family alone can take down about fifty people. We are very well equipped materially and spiritually. We stand by our leader; we will never let him be thrown to the wolves in this country. Let them watch their steps. There are 3-5 [neighbors] in my gated community; my list is ready.”

The moderator of the show, Esra Elönü, supported Noyan, saying: “They should watch all their steps.”

Following the coup attempt in 2016, many people were arrested and jailed in Turkey for allegedly “helping stage the coup attempt.”