RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://victorhanson.com/can-europe-become-western-again/

For the first time in a millennium, Europe no longer plays a critical role in promoting Western civilization nor in world history at large.

Ostensibly it should. Some 750 million people live on the European subcontinent.

Europe still remains the most popular tourist spot on earth. Its hallowed architecture, art, infrastructure, and natural beauty still remind millions of visitors of the world’s once most dynamic and grandiose civilization.

Even now, European nations, in and out of the Europe Union, still produce a combined gross domestic product of $24 trillion, second only to the United States.

Europe’s exports are among the world’s most coveted cars, sophisticated technology, and valued industrial goods.

Yet since World War II, Europe has played an increasingly reduced role in world affairs, despite its membership in the NATO alliance and the growth of the European Union.

Why?

The twentieth-century traumas of World War I and II—in which some 70 million Europeans were killed—saw Europe commit near collective suicide. The ensuing Cold War hinged on protecting a relatively unarmed Europe from an aggressive nuclear Soviet empire on Europe’s borders.

But as World War II and the Cold War faded into memory, Europe did not snap back and assume its centuries-old role as a world leader and beacon of Western Civilization.

Instead, a weary Europe outsourced its security to the United States. It redefined itself as a postmodern, pacifist, socialist utopian project—most recently predicated on redistributionist entitlements, open borders, and radical green policies that have all inevitably ensured European decline.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20174/persecution-of-christians-october

“These rapes are unfortunately customary and serve a specific purpose. It is believed that once no longer a virgin, a girl would become unsuitable for marriage, even if she belongs to a religious minority, and her only choice would be to marry one of her captors. Mishal was then forcibly converted to Islam and married to one of the kidnappers.” – bitterwinter.org, October 24, 2023, Pakistan.

“Some cases do land in courts. But it is not easy for the victims to win them. Sometimes, the victims are treated as if they were the perpetrators….” — bitterwinter.org, October 24, 2023, Pakistan.

“As we returned back to our grass-thatched roof house, we found some of the debris around the house. On entering the house, we found there was a threatening message, ‘Today if we find you around, we shall destroy you with the house. You have become an embarrassment to our Muslim family by joining a wrong religion.'” – morningstarnews.org, October 4, 2023, Uganda.

Regrettably, this scenario—a fire claims Christian lives, only for Muslim authorities to say it was “accidental”—has played out many times in the Middle East.

The following are among the abuses and murders inflicted on Christians by Muslims throughout the month of October 2023.

The Sexual Abuse and Forced Conversion of Christians

Pakistan: Three Muslim men abducted and violently gang-raped a 16-year-old Christian girl, Persis Masih, on her way to Sunday church service. The girl’s father, a pastor, and most of the family had left early for church, while Persis continued to get ready. She never appeared at church and was not home when they returned. After immediately filing a report with police, “the family spent a sleepless night contacting relatives in the hope of finding Persis,” according to the Oct. 1 report. Eventually,

“[T]he family heard Persis moaning for help outside their gate. The culprits, realizing the severity of her condition, had callously dropped her off. Supported by her elder brother Yessi Masih, Persis was brought inside the house, her physical and emotional state in shambles… [After rushing her to a hospital, the] medical examination revealed the horrifying truth—Persis had been gang-raped. Despite the trauma, she bravely identified one of the perpetrators, Muhammad Atif, thanks to the assistance of the local police and CCTV footage.”

https://www.euronews.com/2023/11/23/political-earthquake-in-the-netherlands-anti-islam-populist-geert-wilders-landslide-victor

The far-right populist has won a huge victory in one of the biggest political earthquakes in the Netherlands since World War II.

He’s been called the Dutch Trump. He’s been threatened with death countless times by Islamic extremists, convicted of insulting Moroccans and Britain once banned him from entering the country.

Now Geert Wilders has won a massive election victory in the Netherlands and is in pole position to form the next ruling coalition and possibly become the country’s next prime minister.

His Party for Freedom (PVV) is projected to win 37 seats, according to the latest estimates, well ahead of their nearest rival: A left-wing alliance. 

However, Wilders will likely have to convince other parties to join him in a coalition – something that could prove tricky. His target is 76 seats in the 150-seat parliament.

An exit poll revealing his landslide appeared to take even a 60-year-old political veteran by surprise.

In his first reaction, posted in a video on X, formerly Twitter, he spread his arms wide, put his face in his hands and said simply “35!” – the number of seats the poll then forecasted his party had won. 

Wilders, with his fiery tongue, has long been one of the Netherlands’ best-known lawmakers at home and abroad. His populist policies and shock of peroxide blond hair have drawn comparisons with the former US President Donald Trump.

But, unlike Trump, he seemed destined to spend his life in political opposition.

The only time Wilders came close to governing was when he supported the first coalition formed by Prime Minister Mark Rutte in 2010. But Wilders did not formally join the minority administration and brought it down after just 18 months in office in a dispute over austerity measures. Since then, mainstream parties have shunned him.

They no longer can.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20173/islam-vs-west-conflict

To many on the so-called “Left”, it sometimes appears as if there is no insurmountable conflict between Islam and the West, or between any differing cultures, just old bits of conflict inherited from an obscure past, which will eventually be overcome by greater material equality.

This thesis, which is in fact Marxist — wherein any conflict is always caused by unequal material situations — also is based more on wishful thinking than on historical evidence. Muslims do not massacre Christians, Jews and Hindus because they are richer, but because they are non-Muslims. At least, that is what many mass murderers have been stating for more than ten centuries…

The “clash of civilizations” seems to be about religion, a topic that many in the West thought had been put to bed ages ago.

The “no-go” Islamic zones in Europe, the attacks on 9/11, London’s 7/7 attacks… the murder of Theo Van Gogh, the massacre at the Bataclan, the constant censorship (blasphemy laws), and more: a brief look at recent history of the immigrants bears witness to what seems a pervasive inability, or lack of desire, to adapt to the values of their new host countries.

That, sadly, may be one of the reasons multiculturalism in the West has been such a failure — a failure of the West. When westerners stopped having children, they started importing people en masse, indiscriminately, as if people were all the same. People are not all the same. Many Muslims, or at least a significant proportion of them, seem to have no intention of integrating, or of discarding the values they brought with them, which they appear to prefer to Western values.

Samuel Huntington’s insight into the clash of civilizations is brilliant and true, but a few details in his thesis might benefit from a bit of updating. Moreover, some of his critics, especially on the “Left”, might wish to rethink a few of their “conclusions”.

According to Huntington, since 1989 the clash between civilizations has been essentially cultural, rather than economic or political. The collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989 marked the transition from a world dominated by ideological oppositions — between communism and capitalism, imperialism and its counter-movement — to an era of cultural divergence, with the international political scene simultaneously verging on the multipolar and multicultural.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20171/jihad-on-churches-in-france

A map, published by Christianophobie.fr, which marks with a red pin every spot where a church in France was attacked between just 2017-2018, looks like a war zone. Virtually the entire map of France is covered in red. Even Snopes, which presents itself as the final arbiter on what is real or fake news, admitted the accuracy of the map, while trying to minimize its findings…

One wonders if [Snopes] would be so casual if a Christian vandalized a mosque, or broke into a mosque while screaming Christian slogans?

Christian churches are under attack throughout Western Europe, with very recent examples from Austria, Germany, Italy and Sweden.

No Western nation, however, seems to experience as many attacks on its churches as France, once known as the “Eldest Daughter of the Church.”

Investigative journalist Amy Mek tweeted on July 1, 2023:

“Attacks on Churches are the norm in France; two Churches a day are vandalized — they are being burned, demolished, and abandoned, and their adherents are being sacrificed on the altar of political correctness. Priests are under constant threat. At what point will France’s open border politicians be held responsible?”

That last question inadvertently identifies the culprits — namely, migrants from the Muslim world, where attacks on churches are not abnormal.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/macrons-flip-flop-on-israel-the-result-of-domestic-politics/

On October 7, French President Emmanuel Macron was among the first to declare his solidarity with, and support for, Israel as it began its war to root out Hamas from Gaza. Three weeks later, his tone had changed, and he has now been lecturing Israel on the need to “stop bombing,” which, if Israel were to agree to do so, would constitute a victory for Hamas and a defeat for Israel.

An Israeli official, who does not want to be identified, has said that Macron’s change in attitude toward Israel’s campaign in Gaza was the result of “domestic politics.” By that he meant the pressure on Macron from the five million Muslims in France to end his support for Israel in Gaza, and to start getting tough with the Jewish state. More on this can be found here: “French Jews worry Muslim unrest could see Macron flip on Israel, putting them at risk,” by Canaan Lidor, Times of Israel, November 14, 2023:

Philippe Karsenty, a French-Jewish media analyst and former deputy mayor of the Paris suburb of Neuilly-sur-Seine, was more specific. “Macron is seeking to avoid a civil insurrection by Muslims. He doesn’t want another French intifada, so he’s betraying Israel,” said Karsenty.

Karsenty is exactly right. There are only 500.000 Jews in France, but nearly five million Muslims, or ten times as many. When the Jews march, as they do so very seldom, they do so, in quiet and dignified fashion, only to express their alarm over antisemitism, and their solidarity with the embattled Jewish state. There is no yelling, no violence, no setting fire to cars, no attacks on police stations and mayoral offices.

But when the Muslim mobs form, they yell their hatred of Jews and of the French, smash shop windows, set thousands of cars on fire, ignore police orders to stop their vandalism and disperse, and even fight with the police — an entirely different affair from the Jewish marches. And if a Muslim is injured or killed by the police when fleeing, all hell breaks loose throughout the Hexagon.

https://www.jns.org/argentinas-first-jewish-president-milei-wins-decisive-victory/

Argentina’s newly elected president, Javier Milei, won a resounding victory on Sunday on promises to save the country’s crumbling economy. But Jewish issues, too, are close to his heart.

“I am thinking about converting to Judaism and I aspire to become the first Jewish president in Argentine history,” Milei has said, according to Argentina’s Radio Perfil.

He promises to move the Argentinian embassy in Israel to Jerusalem and to make the Jewish state his first international stop as president.

Milei, an iconoclastic outsider who entered politics in 2020 vowing to “blow up” the system, won by 56% to 44% against his rival, Peronist Economy Minister Sergio Massa.

Milei makes no secret of his philo-semitism, which appears to have made little difference with the Argentinian electorate, despite its being 92% Catholic. (Jews make up less than 1% of the population, though at 200,000 it is the largest Jewish population in Latin America.)

He told La Nacion, “I don’t go to church. I go to synagogue. I don’t follow a priest. I follow my rabbi. I learn Torah. I’m known internationally as a friend of Israel. And as someone who learns Torah, I’m almost Jewish. I’m just missing the ‘blood covenant.’”

He took the stage at his rock concert-like election rallies—as a teenager, Milei was the vocalist for a Rolling Stones cover band—to the sound of a shofar. At one rally in August, an image of a Jew dressed in a tallit, or prayer shawl, was projected onto a giant screen as the shofar sounded.

http://www.settimananews.it/informazione-internazionale/us-and-china-difficult-coups-and-institutions/

American newspapers are voicing growing concern that Donald Trump, who is running for president, is sounding more like Mussolini and Hitler.[1] Also, following the 2020 January 6 attack on Capitol Hill, something like a preview of an attempted coup, some fear Trump may be tempted to repeat the game, only this time better organized.

However, there are substantial differences between Trump and Hitler, Mussolini, or Lenin, the master of it all. In all these cases, the tricks worked because they had the backing of the army and the national police, who thought they had been wronged; one way or another, they had no voice, and they were ready to support whoever gave them that representation.

With Lenin, the army was tired of fighting a war they deemed unwinnable against Germany, and the German command, who aided his return to Russia, saw clearly that he was the man to deliver on it.

With Mussolini, the army and many veterans felt deprived of better results from the victory in World War I. They wanted to topple a political system they thought was giving in to dangerous communist revolutionaries. With Hitler, the army felt stabbed in the back because the terms of surrender were too harsh and chafed under a civilian government ready to give in, again, to socialists and communists.

To stage a coup

Presently, the situation in the US, like in Israel at the time of the protests against the constitutional reforms, looks pretty different. The army and the security apparently do not side with Trump; they are neutral, if not hostile to him.

In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tried to implement reforms that would remove some powers from the judiciary and concentrate them on the executive. The reform was bitterly opposed by large parts of the population and most of the army and the security bodies.

The long Israeli struggle between the government and part of the military — and the ensuing mutual distrust — was certainly the breeding ground for the intelligence failure leading to the October 7 Hamas attack.

https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/11/19/the-sinister-rise-of-the-islamo-left/

Is Hamas a terrorist group? This was the question posed to former UK Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn by Piers Morgan on his Monday evening TalkTV show. It wasn’t a difficult question. Corbyn was being invited to condemn a group that had raped, tortured and slaughtered hundreds upon hundreds of Israelis just over a month ago, on 7 October.

Yet Corbyn couldn’t do it. Morgan asked the same question no fewer than 15 times. Each time, Corbyn, growing ever more irascible, avoided answering. He preferred instead to witter on about needing to ‘start a process that leads to a ceasefire’. His programming just wouldn’t allow him to respond. He was in the grip of the political equivalent of ‘computer says no’. (To be fair, Corbyn has now referred to Hamas as a ‘terrorist group’ in an article for Tribune, a full four days after refusing to do so on TalkTV, and a full seven years after referring to the group as ‘friends‘ at a public meeting.)

Corbyn’s shocking reluctance, when challenged by Morgan, to call out Hamas for what it is – a violently repressive Islamist group committed to the annihilation of Israel and Jews – is not just a personal failing. It is also the failing of much of what passes for the left in general today, from Labour’s Corbynista fringe to bourgeois academic ‘theorists’ to the hard-left activists organising those interminable ‘pro-Palestine’ demos. They all labour under the same delusion as Corbyn – namely, that Islamist groups like Hamas are at the vanguard of the global resistance to the West. And that Israel and its Western allies are inherently evil.

This is what needs to be interrogated here. Not Corbyn’s absurdist performance on Piers Morgan Uncensored. But the broader leftist milieu that enabled Corbyn’s performance. A milieu that now cleaves so closely to Islamism that it actually sees its regressive, violent antipathy to modernity as progressive. Indeed, a milieu among which there have even been some willing to hail Hamas’s pogrom and declare 7 October a ‘day of celebration’.

The roots of this moral and political degeneration run deep. Most of the blame lies with the left’s abandonment of class politics in favour of identity politics. This wasn’t deliberate exactly. It was primarily a response to the political defeats endured by the British working class in the 1980s, followed by the collapse of Communism abroad. By the 1990s, some on the left, disoriented and disillusioned, were turning away from – and increasingly turning against – the working class. In its place, they were starting to champion particular identity groups and to campaign around identitarian issues.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20153/france-two-demos

Sunday’s march… attracted over 100,000 people, five times larger than the pro-Palestine demo.

There were also many Muslim figures [Sunday] including imams of mosques who ignored the “advice” of the Grand Mosque of Paris not to attend.

Anti-Semitism isn’t a byproduct of the Israel-Palestine conflict; it is an evil in its own right and a threat to what even the politically correct Macron says he upholds as “values of our civilization.”

Anti-Semitism challenges the fundamentals of what one may call modern civilization. It denies the existence of human beings as individuals with inalienable rights beyond religious, ethnic, racial and other backgrounds. It dissolves the concept of citizenship as the basis of the relationship between the individual and the state.

Anti-Semitism also violates the principle under which guilt by association and collective punishment could not be accepted. Worse still, it rejects the principle of innocence until proven guilty by a court of one’s peers, thus sapping the roots of civilized legal systems.

A week after Paris witnessed a march in support of the “Palestinian cause” it hosted another march on November 12, this time against anti-Semitism.

Ostensibly provoked by the ongoing war in Gaza the two marches may persuade the French to take a closer look at the messages they convey and their impact on French politics.

Despite denials by its organizers, the leftist and extreme left parties, the first march, which took part on the right bank of the River Seine, was clearly anti-Israel, at times with anti-Semitic undertones.