RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/13543/strasbourg-capital-europe

A quarter of the Strasbourg’s public school students choose the halal menu in school cafeterias.

In October, from Strasbourg, the European Court of Human Rights upheld the shameful conviction of an Austrian woman for what the court called an “abusive attack on the Prophet of Islam” — just like that, in a stroke, accepting and legitimizing Islam’s blasphemy laws. It was, as one news analyst, born in Iran, took note, “the day free speech died in Europe.”

“Strasbourg,” according to the city’s official website, “embodies the fundamental values ​​of Europe”. But if the current trend continues, these values will be the opposite of those, such as freedom of expression, on which Europe was founded.

“New York, Geneva and Strasbourg are the only cities in the world which are home to international institutions without being national capitals”, an official page of the French city proudly proclaims. “The choice of Strasbourg as the European capital following the Second World War is no accident. The city stands as a shining symbol of reconciliation between peoples and of the future of Europe”.

Last December, however, Strasbourg was shocked by a new terrorist attack. Cherif Chekatt, shouting “Allahu Akbar”, murdered five people, before being neutralized in a two-day manhunt. Among Chekatt’s victims were Italian, Polish and French citizens. Unfortunately, Strasbourg has become one of Europe’s hotbeds of jihadism, an ideology seemingly aimed at destroying Europe’s people, not conciliating with them.

The weekly Valeurs Actuelles called Strasbourg a “French bastion of jihadism”. Seven men from Strasbourg, who went to Syria between December 2013 and April 2014, have already been sentenced to prison terms ranging from six to nine years. The heaviest sentence was handed to Karim Mohamed-Aggad, the brother of the Bataclan Theater suicide bomber Foued Mohamed-Aggad. The weekly L’Obs called Strasbourg “land of jihad”.

“It’s true that we have statistically more ‘S-Files’ [individuals labelled by authorities as a threat to national security] here in Strasbourg and in the Bas-Rhin department than the national average”, the mayor of Strasbourg, Roland Ries, said. Farhad Khosrokhavar, a sociologist and director of studies at the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences in Paris, explained:

“Strasbourg is one of those leading cities of what could be called ‘jihadogenic urban areas’, such as the suburbs of Paris, Toulouse, Nice or Lyon in the past… Strasbourg is at the crossroads of Europe, all you have to do is cross the Rhine to be in Germany and you are not very far from Switzerland.”

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/272566/do-pakistans-blasphemy-laws-trump-americas-1st-jules-gomes

The religious police who patrol the precincts of Twitter recently slapped Jamie Glazov, the editor of Frontpagemag.com and the author of Jihadist Psychopath: How He Is Charming, Seducing, and Devouring Us, with anti-free speech blasphemy codes. The social media giant threatened Glazov with the Section 37 of PECA-2016, Section 295 B and Section 295 C of the Pakistan penal code.

Jihad Watch’s Robert Spencer has documented how Twitter, along with other leading social media venues, is enforcing Sharia compliance. In the new world of Western dhimmitude, Twitter, acting on behalf of the Pakistan government, is informing American citizens that they could be imprisoned or hanged for insulting Islam.

This new global imposition of Islamic blasphemy law is the handiwork of a leftist playboy on a Muslim prayer mat. This figure of utter incongruity, loved by liberal Westerners, was once a world-class cricketer and Pakistan’s most successful cricket captain—and cricket, a sport foreign to Americans, is the quintessential sport of the gentleman.

As a cricket-loving boy growing up in Bombay, my walls were plastered with posters of Imran Khan. The cricket captain is now Pakistan’s Prime Minister and a poster boy for his nation’s barbaric blasphemy laws – search no further for a striking study in cognitive dissonance.

Oxford-educated Imran Khan, dressed in a mink coat and Mao cap, is equally fluent in the double-speak of radical Islam to his in-house audience and moderate Islam as a mode of public relations discourse. Since his time at Oxford University, Khan also learned to speak the progressive tongue of the social justice warrior tribes.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/01/mays-historic-defeat-and-swift-triumph/

Parliamentarians are risking No Deal or No Brexit.

Brexit has temporarily transformed the governing laws of parliamentarian democracy. Theresa May finally submitted her negotiated deal for withdrawal from the European Union to Parliament this week. This is the effort on which her entire premiership has been staked. It takes up nearly all the energy of her government. And Parliament delivered its verdict by voting it down 432 to 202. In other words, it told her: You have failed miserably at the one thing your government was supposed to do.

Historians are searching for some parallel example of the government’s business being so viciously rejected by Parliament. Losses by 60 votes or 90 votes have invariably caused prime ministers to resign, or triggered no-confidence votes that those PMs promptly lost. May’s loss also triggered a no-confidence vote. And even though the Parliament had utterly and viciously rejected her government’s main piece of legislation, the most important bill in decades, Theresa May won it easily.

So what in the world is going on in Westminster?

As I’ve outlined before, there are two crises at work. The first is a crisis of responsibility in Parliament. Theresa May’s deal may not be what hard Brexiteers wanted. But they have neither the votes nor the courage to oust May and expose their own Brexit to parliamentary and public criticism. And they certainly don’t have the votes in Parliament to pass their preferred terms. By shooting down a deal that has been negotiated with over two dozen other European heads of state, with the clock ticking down, their rejection of their party leader’s deal makes the possibility of crashing out of the EU without a deal at the end of March more likely, or it will provoke the rest of Parliament to delay or cancel Brexit altogether, possibly inflicting yet another national referendum on the issue.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/13537/india-tolerance-terrorism

Engaging in “dialogue” with the separatists and the Taliban makes little sense. Neither group has demonstrated any faith in the values of modern civilization and democracy. Contrary to claims on the part of Jammu and Kashmir separatists and Pakistan — that India never offered “unconditional dialogue,” and has been rejecting Islamabad’s peace overtures — it is actually Pakistan’s propaganda against Indian society that is responsible for the violence in Kashmir.

In fact, according to a 2017 Indian Intelligence Bureau report, Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence paid separatist leaders Rs 80,000,000 (approximately $1.2 million) to fuel unrest in Kashmir. These leaders include Syed Ali Shah Geelani and Asiya Andrabi, both of whom are reported to have links to Hizbul Mujahideen, a J&K separatist group that in August 2017 was designated by the U.S. State Department as a Foreign Terrorist Organization.

New Delhi’s soft approach to the J&K separatists can only serve to embolden extremist forces. The Modi government also needs to refrain from extending any goodwill gestures to the Taliban — a junior partner of Qaeda that aims to establish an Islamic caliphate in the Indian subcontinent, including in Jammu and Kashmir.

The current administration in Washington, like that in Jerusalem, grasps that all of the above radical groups have “common political targets — the United States, India and Israel.” Rather than risk being seduced by the false notion that it is possible to negotiate with terrorists, India would do well to reach out to its main democratic allies: the U.S. and Israel.

When the Narendra Modi-led government came to power in India with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in May 2014, the public hoped that a peaceful resolution would be reached over the strife-torn northern state of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K).

A key element of the BJP’s platform had been a policy of “zero tolerance towards terrorism.” Yet, since Modi’s election, the situation in J&K — which has been the focus of a long-standing conflict between India and Pakistan, with minority Hindus fleeing Islamist violence in 1990 — has worsened. No Hindu has returned to the Kashmir Valley during Modi’s premiership, and the number of Indian civilians and security personnel killed in attacks by Pakistani militants has increased. In fact, during the four-year period between 2014 and 2018, 75 more Indian soldiers and other security personnel were killed in J&K than during the previous five years (219, compared to 144).

https://www.wsj.com/articles/kenyan-forces-in-standoff-with-militants-after-attack-on-hotel-complex-11547620051

NAIROBI, Kenya—Islamist militants’ deadly 18-hour siege of an upscale complex here jolts a key U.S. ally in the war on terrorism and raises questions over how the Somalia-based insurgents have survived more than a decade of international military campaigns.

On Tuesday afternoon, unmasked attackers carrying AK-47s and explosives shot their way into the 14 Riverside hotel and office complex in the capital—a favorite hangout for foreigners and upper-class Kenyans—detonated at least one suicide bomb and barricaded themselves in with hundreds of hostages overnight. It took until late Wednesday morning for Kenyan special forces to kill five gunmen and free the remaining captives.

By then, at least 20 people, among them a Kenyan accountant for Colgate-Palmolive Co. and an American who specialized in development finance, were dead. A police officer later succumbed to his injuries in hospital.

The foyer of the DusitD2 hotel, an emblem of Nairobi’s emergence as East Africa’s business hub, was covered in blood and debris; parked outside were the skeletons of several incinerated cars.

Al-Shabaab, a Somali extremist group affiliated with al Qaeda, claimed responsibility for the assault. Kenyan police said it had arrested two people it believes helped facilitate the attack. CONTINUE AT SITE

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/01/16/15-killed-islamist-attack-kenya-hotel-complex-continues/

A member of the SAS helped save hundreds of lives when he charged into gunfire to rescue civilians trapped during a terrorist attack in Nairobi.

A mission mounted by Kenyan forces on Wednesday ended a 20-hour assault on 14 Riverside, a luxury hotel and office complex in one of the city’s most affluent districts, killing at least some of the perpetrators.

Uhuru Kenyatta, the Kenyan president, said that 14 civilians were killed before the attack was ended in one of the biggest military operations ever mounted in the capital.

At least one Briton was killed and one other badly wounded, amid fears that the true death toll could be higher after the Kenyan Red Cross disclosed that as many as 50 people remained unaccounted for.

The unidentified SAS soldier, reportedly in Kenya to train and mentor local special forces, often appeared to be at the forefront of the operation, frequently pictured bringing civilians to safety.

Although on non-combat deployment, he raced to the scene within the first hour of the attack, wearing body armour over civilian clothes and a balaclava to cover his face.

In one photograph from the scene, he carries the limp, bleeding body of a victim. Another shows the soldier bursting into the hotel complex with his special forces issue C8 Diemaco rifle drawn.

He reportedly worked with US Navy Seals, operating under Kenyan command, during the mission.

British special forces, who regularly train the equivalent troops of foreign nations, are not meant to engage in any direct combat on such missions.

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/isis-claims-credit-for-syrian-bombing-that-left-two-americans-dead/

Reuters, citing a “U.S. official,” reported Wednesday morning that four American officials were killed and three were wounded in the bombing. A spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition confirmed that American troops were killed in the incident but did not specify as to the number of casualties.

The Islamic State claimed credit Wednesday for a suicide bombing that left at least two U.S. troops dead in the coalition-controlled city of Manbij in northern Syria.

The blast, which ISIS claimed credit for on their official propaganda website Amaq, killed at least nineteen people in total, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The ISIS propaganda website indicated that a single suicide bomber wearing a bomb vest targeted a patrol of U.S.-led coalition forces. It’s the first time ISIS has claimed credit for an attack on coalition forces since President Trump announced all U.S. troops would withdraw from Syria.

“The President has been fully briefed and we will continue to monitor the ongoing situation in Syria,” White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said in a statement.

The decision to withdraw from Syria, which Trump reportedly made last month during a call with the Turkish president, led to the resignation of former Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis. Critics of the decision have pointed out that while ISIS has been cleared from the vast majority of its former territorial holdings, roughly 30,000 fighters remain in the region.

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/ten-thoughts-on-theresa-mays-brexit-deal-defeat/

1. Theresa May’s defeat by the unexpectedly large margin of 230 votes last night was indeed “historic,” as every bore in journalism and punditry wrote — but only because of its size: It was the largest defeat for a government on a major issue in parliamentary history. Some of the earlier defeats turned out to be historic in a more substantial sense — Neville Chamberlain’s loss of Tory support in the 1940 Norway debate, leading to the appointment of Winston Churchill as prime minister, is the best example (though Chamberlain was not actually defeated but won the vote). Other such votes were less important because they didn’t lead to much, such as the vote of no confidence in the 1924 Labour government, which led to Stanley Baldwin’s lackluster “Safety First” Tory government, which in turn lost the following election — which, come to think of it, may not be a bad forecast of the unexciting May regime.

2. Don’t trust any of the predictions that as a result of this vote, some particular next-step “option” is now off the agenda because it lacks parliamentary support. That’s because no single option for Brexit or Remain currently enjoys a parliamentary majority. All, however, have some prospect of succeeding in eventually amassing such a majority. That even includes a No Deal Brexit, since that’s what will happen unless a majority of MPs gradually gather around another option. Most media people either don’t know that or don’t want you to know that because they disapprove of No Deal and of the kind of voters who support it.

3. It’s always interesting to compare the expected effects of a surprise upset with the actual effects. For most of the last year, press commentary treated the Tory Brexiteers as the main opposition to the soft-as-putty Brexit that became May’s Withdrawal Agreement. Yet when its defeat was announced, the large pro-Remain crowd outside Parliament cheered lustily. It was important to them that the Brexiteers should not enjoy a victory. So they claimed it as their own in the hope of ensuring that they do actually benefit. Similarly, pre-vote there had been dire media predictions that a defeat for May would mean a fall in the pound. It was the predictions that collapsed, however, when May’s defeat led to a rise in the pound. It was swiftly explained by the financial pundits that it was the very size of May’s defeat that caused the pound to rise rather than fall, because it might mean we would now get an even softer Brexit than before. Hmmnnn. I’m not sure that would convince me if I’d lost money following their first advice.

4. Another factor at play here is the confusion that May herself causes by constantly reiterating her absolute determination to achieve Brexit and fulfill the instruction given by the voters in the referendum. That doesn’t deceive the Westminster village, but it has persuaded others that she is a symbol of Brexit at any price. In reality, she is a symbol of subordinating Brexit to the wishes of a Remain establishment and cabinet without seeming to do so. She is thus a cause of confusion and an obstacle to any fruitful change of government and/or Tory policy in response to last night’s defeat. Her rhetoric will probably remain strong, but she will likely be as weak towards the Labour and Tory Remain Ultras like Dominic Grieve as she has been towards the EU negotiators and the establishment. Unless she undergoes a Damascene conversion, she will now open negotiations with Opposition parties and her own Remainer rebels on the next Plan B while ramping up her Brexit language to keep Brexiteers happy and Boris at bay. This kicking the can down the road works until you run out of road, which in this case will be the 29th of March — and that means on present form that she will try to get the EU to agree to a postponement of Brexit. That would keep open a Pandora’s Box of competing alternatives to Brexit that the fixed date was intend to close firmly.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/01/theresa-may-brexit-deal-defeat/After two years of political dysfunction, the British prime minister’s future is as unclear as her country’s.

The only meaningful unity that the United Kingdom has seen in the past two years has been opposition to the Brexit deal Prime Minister Theresa May negotiated with the European Union. That agreement, as predicted, suffered a crushing blow in the House of Commons today, voted down by a 432-to-202 margin in what was instantly the worst parliamentary defeat in history.

The defeat, as predicted, has prompted Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn to propose a vote, expected to be held on Wednesday, of no confidence in the government. When future historians consider Brexit, they will surely marvel at May’s obstinate capacity for survival in the face of unending political humiliation. Though her authority is all but nil at this point, if she hangs on tomorrow, her leadership will be further cemented. What doesn’t kill me makes me stronger, though it still doesn’t bring me Brexit . . .

May’s final plea before the defeat was that “a vote against this deal is a vote for nothing more than uncertainty, division, and the very real risk of no deal,” or worse, “no Brexit at all.” Which is true. Labour is just as split as the Tories on the question of how to proceed. Corbyn now faces enormous pressure from his own back-benchers to back a second referendum, and has shown no sign at any point of having an alternative to May’s deal in mind.

That is because there were only ever two alternatives to May’s deal, as the EU saw it: no-deal Brexit (which they deem disastrous) or no Brexit at all (which they’d quite like). For the British people, the choice was simpler still — faith in Brexit or no faith in Brexit. Now it seems that Britain faces two distinct but inexorably linked crises: a crisis of government and a crisis of legitimacy. Should both crises collide, it is hard to imagine the havoc that would ensue.