RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/12694/ethiopia-eritrea-a-new-hope-for-peace

By renegotiating the U.S. African Growth and Opportunity Act, [US President Donald J. Trump] can strengthen American exports, create new export-related jobs and foster development-oriented investment on the continent. By reforming U.S. humanitarian aid to Africa, he can cut considerable bureaucratic waste, and effectively increase assistance without increasing the cost.

Washington can also take advantage of the close relationships between them and one of its biggest allies, Sheikh Mohammed Bin Zayed, Crown Prince of UAE, who has a strong ties with many African leaders and who has played an important role during the different negotiations between Ethiopia and Eritrea.

UAE’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan, has welcomed the reestablishment of cordial relations between Ethiopia and Eritrea. He has stressed that such an agreement will positively reflect on boosting security and stability in both countries, the Horn of Africa and the MENA region.

Making America great again, as Trump’s campaign slogan goes, means helping Africa rise and stabilize.

The leaders of Ethiopia and Eritrea signed a declaration on July 9, ending a state of war between the two countries. It was a major step toward resolving one of post-colonial Africa’s bloodiest and most protracted conflicts.

The U.N. Security Council said the peace declaration signed by Ethiopia and Eritrea after 20 years as enemies “represents a historic and significant development with far-reaching positive consequences for the Horn of Africa and beyond.”

https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/270716/france-gives-muslim-killer-elderly-jewish-woman-daniel-greenfield

Every other Muslim terrorist or killer in Europe has his actions blamed on mental illness or drug use. This just continues the pattern. I wrote about the murder of Sarah Halimi last year.

Sarah Lucy Halimi was thrown out of the window of the third floor Paris apartment while she begged her Muslim killer to spare her life.

The 66-year-old director of an Orthodox Jewish nursery was woken from her sleep when she was violently beaten by her twenty something Muslim neighbor who then dragged her to the window.

She died on the street outside the building where she had lived for thirty years.

The killer had allegedly shouted, “Allahu Akbar”. In the tragic comedy of denial that every Islamic terrorism investigation inevitably becomes, the authorities are still hunting around for his motiv

Yonathan Halimi, Sarah Lucy’s son, describes the killer’s family as being known for its anti-Semitism. “One day, one of the killer’s sisters pushed my sister down the stairs, and the next time she called her a dirty Jew,” he described. Sarah’s brother said that the killer called Sarah and her daughter, “dirty Jews”.

The authorities stonewalled at every turn. And, predictably, the killer gets a pass. Allahu Akbar usually means motive unknown.

http://www.atimes.com/article/israel-hosts-uae-military-delegation-to-review-f-35s-report/

In a show of what some are calling a burgeoning Israeli-Gulf alliance against Iran, a military delegation from the United Arab Emirates is said to have traveled to Israel to get a first-hand look at advanced F-35 fighter jets acquired from the US.

Israel’s i24NEWS reported the event, citing unnamed sources who said that a US delegation was also present for the visit.

The UAE is said to be looking to become the second Middle Eastern country, after Israel, to have the fifth-generation fighter jet.

Israel received its first delivery of the Lockheed Martin-made stealth aircraft in 2016 and declared this year that it was the first country to use the jet in combat. It was later reported that the chief of the Israeli Air Force was chided by cabinet members for showing off the plane’s exploits with a photo of an Israeli F-35 flying above Lebanon.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-human-cost-of-swedens-welfare-state-1531346908

American liberals sometimes hold up Sweden as a model of social order, equality of the sexes, and respect for parental responsibilities. Its welfare state offers excellent free or subsidized prenatal care, 480 days of paid leave for both natural and adoptive parents, and additional leave for moms who work in physically strenuous jobs. Swedish parents have the option to reduce their normal hours (and pay) up to 25% until a child turns 8.

But all this assistance comes at a steep cost. At 61.85%, Sweden has the highest personal income tax rate in the world. That money pays for the kind of support many American women would welcome, but it comes with pressure on women to return to the workforce on the government’s schedule, not their own. The Swedish government also supports and subsidizes institutionalized day care (they call it preschool), promoting the belief that professional care-givers are better for children than their own mothers.

If a mother decides she wants to stay at home with her child beyond the state-sanctioned maternity leave, she receives no additional allowance. That creates an extreme financial burden on those families, and the pressure is social as well. A 32-year-old friend told me that she was in the park with her 2-year-old son, when she was surrounded by a group of women who berated her for not having the boy in day care.

The Swedish government attempts to provide equal work opportunities for both sexes, which is laudable. But toward that end, it promotes the false idea that mothers are not uniquely important to babies. Women who prefer to stay home with very young children are stigmatized as regressive and antifeminist. The Feminist Initiative, a radical political party, touts day care as a way to “liberate women from their maternal instincts.”

Sweden’s maternity policies may be good for economic growth and egalitarian ideals, but not for the social or emotional health of young children. Ample scientific research shows that institutionalized day care is bad for very young children. The ratio of staff to children is too low, and the environment is confusing, overly stimulating and potentially harmful to a child’s developing brain.

Ninety percent of Swedish children under 5 are in day care. This likely contributes to mental-health problems. In 2012 roughly 20% of Swedish adolescents reported at least five instances of self-harming behavior, and the teen suicide rate hit a 25-year high in 2013. CONTINUE AT SITE

The Essenes were part of an internal struggle within Jewish society at the end of the Second Temple Period. Their customs and beliefs, their apocalyptic vision and rejection of accepted leadership not only created a rift between them and the rest of Jewish society; they provided elements for the beginning of a new religion.

The Last Supper which Jesus shared with his disciples was probably a Passover meal prepared with unleavened bread and wine; the Dead Sea Scrolls describe a sacred meal of bread and wine that will be eaten at the end of days with the messiah. Were Essene concepts and rituals incorporated into Christian ceremonies, like communion? The early Christian church was communistic; similarly, members of the Qumran community had to give up all private property. Both Christians and Essenes were eschatological communities — expecting the imminent transformation of the world. Although drawn from Jewish prophetic texts that spoke about the Day of Judgment, the Essenes gave it immediacy; Christianity gave it urgency. The similarity of texts is striking.

In the Gospel of Luke, an angel appears to the Virgin Mary and announces: “And now you will conceive in your womb and bear a son and you will name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the son of the Most High…the son of God.” (Luke 1:31-35) Nearly the same language appears in one of the Dead Sea scrolls: “He will be called great and he will be called Son of God, and they will call him Son of the Most High…He will judge the earth in righteousness…and every nation will bow down to him…” (4Q 246)

Both communities tended to be dualistic — dividing the world into opposing forces of good and evil, light and darkness. There are references in the New Testament (especially in Paul and John) to this distinction. For example, “I am the light of the world; he who follows me will not walk in darkness” (John 8:12). And in the scrolls we read, “All the children of righteousness are ruled by the Prince of Light and walk in the ways of light, but all the children of falsehood are ruled by the Angel of Darkness and walk in the ways of darkness.” (Rule of the Community, 3) Even the famous beatitudes in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:3-12) and in the Sermon on the Plain (Luke 6:20-23) have striking parallels in the scrolls and apocryphal literature.

https://www.jpost.com/Jerusalem-Report

According to the four Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, someone called “John the Baptist” who

lived in “the wilderness” was baptizing in Bethabara, on the eastern side of the Jordan River near where it flows into the Dead Sea. When Jesus approached him, John exclaimed: “Behold the Lamb of God, which removes sin from the world… I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove and it rested upon him …” (John 1: 28) This experience transformed Jesus and changed the course of history.

The event is retold in Matthew 3: 16. “When Jesus was baptized he arose from the water and the heavens opened and the Spirit of God descended upon him like a dove … and a voice from heaven uttered, ‘This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased.’ ” Mark 1: 10 and Luke 3:21-22 repeat this seminal event in Jesus’ life marking the beginning of his mission to redeem the world and what became a new theology based on ideas that were common among the Essenes – but not Judaism.

Josephus described John as “a good man (who) commanded the Jews to exercise virtue and piety towards God, and so to come to baptism; for the washing with water would be acceptable to him … not in order (for) the remission of some sins, but for the purification of the body, assuming that the soul was thoroughly purified beforehand by righteousness.” (Antiquities of the Jews, Book 18, Chapter 5)

Although baptism today is associated with Christianity, its origin is in a traditional Jewish practice of immersion in a mikvah that is part of the monthly ritual purification for women following menstruation. Ritual immersion as a purification rite for males is commanded in Torah, but little is known about this practice during the First Temple period. Natural water sources were used, for example Jerusalem’s Gihon spring (in the Kidron Valley), but it was inconvenient. Moreover, what was done when such sources were not available?

http://standpointmag.co.uk/node/7213/full
The United Nations High Commission for Refugees hosted the first ever TEDx event in a refugee camp in early June. Halima Aden, hijab-wearing Vogue supermodel, attended; it was the first time the 20-year-old had been back to Kakuma, northern Kenya, since she was resettled in the US as a nine-year-old. Four planes and eight flights delivered around 350 dignitaries and VIPs from around the world to participate in making refugees cool again. The one-day extravaganza, which is estimated to have cost close to $400,000, raised a range of issues questioning long-held assumptions in the humanitarian sphere.

As the paradigm shift hits, the UN is looking to change a policy that after 25 years is no longer sustainable. With increased domestic pressure in donor countries to justify spending, the focus has transformed from providing cradle-to-grave aid to empowering refugees to find solutions for themselves.

TEDx, the elite media organisation that posts aspirational online talks, showed refugees as agents of positive change and valuable members of society, not simply a drain on host country resources.

At the same time the UNHCR is under fierce pressure to reduce its expenditure and is making millions of dollars of savings with staff being moved to where they are actually needed.

The UNHCR’s mandate is to protect refugees, safeguard their fundamental human rights and help to build a better future. But critics said the Kakuma event was a waste of money which could have been better spent on a new hospital or a school. Those in favour said that by raising the profile of the issue, it did incalculable good.

Former UNHCR head Antonio Guterres, now UN Secretary-General, is trying to reform a system with which he is intimately acquainted, but there doesn’t seem much reason to be positive. Refugees are big business, and subliminal pressure exists to keep the system going. That’s one reason refugees have been made into needy victims, who need supplies of tarpaulins, non-food items, sanitation, water and tents, all of which translates into money. If people are seen as capable of standing on their own feet, those contracts aren’t needed, and without victims, there’s no business. Why find a solution if it threatens livelihoods?

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/12692/germany-turkish-boxing-gang

The gang, most of whose members are Turkish Germans, is said to be involved in organized criminal activity in all of Germany’s 16 federal states. It is also believed to have close ties to the government of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

The gang, which profits from prostitution, extortion and the trafficking of weapons and drugs, operates across Europe. The group claims to have more than 3,500 members in Germany and elsewhere.

The German ban comes less than a day after Buzzfeed, an American internet media company, falsely accused Gatestone Institute of fabricating the existence of such gangs in Germany.

German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer has banned a Turkish boxing gang called “Osmanen Germania BC” (“Germania Ottomans”) on the grounds that it poses a serious threat to public order.

The gang, most of whose members are Turkish Germans, is said to be involved in organized criminal activity in all of Germany’s 16 federal states. It is also believed to have close ties to the government of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

The German ban comes less than a day after Buzzfeed, an American internet media company, falsely accused Gatestone Institute of fabricating the existence of such gangs in Germany.

Seehofer said the gang “poses a serious threat to individual legal interests and for the general public.” He added:

“Once again, the federal government and the federal states have shown that they are resolutely fighting all manifestations of organized crime in Germany, including rocker-like groups such as Osmanen Germania BC, whose members commit serious crimes. Those who reject the rule of law cannot expect any kind of leniency from us.”

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/12680/france-freeing-extremists

The same government that wants to deport Japanese investors, accepted 100,000 migrants from Sub-Saharan and Northern Africa alone in 2017 — most of them with no skills and no money.

The same government that wants to deport the Japanese creators of a spectacular new wine in France is about to release from prison an Al Qaeda terrorist, Djamel Beghal, linked to the Charlie Hebdo massacre in 2015.

“We fear a possible connection between Muslim gangs from the suburbs and jihadists soon to be liberated on one hand, and jihadists coming back from war in Iraq  on the other”. — A source who asked to remain anonymous.

A curious story is getting attention in France. Two Japanese winemakers who have been living in Banyuls-sur-Mer since 2016 were notified that they would have to leave France due to a lack of financial resources. Rie Shoji, 42, and Hirofumi Shoji, 38, had arrived there in 2011 with the idea of ​​ becoming winemakers. First they worked as farm workers and wine merchants in Bordeaux and Burgundy, and studied and received degrees in farm management and oenology. In 2016, they invested 150,000 euros ($170,000) to buy land. Their plan was to produce a natural, organic wine, in an area — the eastern Pyrenees — where everything is done by hand.

Their first wine, named Pedres Blanques, appeared in 2017, and was considered a “revelation”. It is already on the wine list of many famous restaurants in France and Spain. “Its price is skyrocketing,” said  their lawyer, Jean Codognès, “and the prefecture is saying that their wine has no future. The government is not thinking straight”.

The same government that wants to deport Japanese investors has accepted 100,000 migrants from Sub-Saharan and Northern Africa just in 2017, most of them with no skills and no money.

The same government that wants to deport the Japanese creators of a spectacular new wine in France is about to release from prison an Al Qaeda terrorist, Djamel Beghal, linked to the Charlie Hebdo massacre in 2015.

https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2018/07/legacy-lessons-barbarossa/

The hallmark and genesis of the Great Patriotic War, as Russians call it, was the political incompetence of the Soviet leadership, their naiveté, paranoia and blind reliance on a Marxist interpretation of world events. Marx is no longer the Kremlin’s sacred text, but all else has changed little if at all.

June 22, 1941 – its the date which is engraved in memory of all who had a misfortune to be born in the USSR. This was the day Operation Barbarossa began, the Nazi attack on the Soviet Union. By today’s date, July 10, German forces were at Kiev’s doorstep and, behind the rapidly advancing front line, the Wehrmacht and SS were firmly in control. On this day Jews were being massacred in the Polish town of Jedwabne, as they would be in countless other locations.

In retrospect, the clash between Hitler and Stalin was inevitable, two predators willing and ready to spill blood generously to achieve their delusional dreams of world dominance. Both required enemies to hate to consolidate their hold on their respective populations. The Nazis were focusing their need for hatred on the Jews. The Soviets were concentrating on the ‘evil’ of the international bourgeoisie. The Soviets adopted pseudo-scientific Marxist theories of class struggle as the basis for the extermination of millions of unwanted souls. The Nazis based their extermination programs on the equally pseudo-scientific theories of race and social Darwinism. Both regimes were quite successful in brainwashing their followers. Both were socialists with insignificant ideological variations. Even flags, songs and holidays were similar. The difference between the Nazis and the Soviets, described as the divide between the evil ‘Right’ and the noble ‘Left’, has always struck me as being contrived and nonsensical.

The beginning of the direct war between the USSR and the Nazi Germany was characterized by the extraordinary series of events. The two countries were allies and, following the infamous Molotov-Ribbentrop treaty, which stunned the world at the time, were busily dividing Europe. Hitler was grabbing France, Netherlands, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Greece, Yugoslavia and the Western half of Poland. Stalin, not to be outdone, was getting Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Mongolia, parts of Hungary, Romania and Eastern Poland. Stalin demanded an increase of his share of the European spoils during the Molotov’s visit to Berlin in 1940. Hitler refused and activated the contingency plan of attack on the Soviet Union ‘Barbarossa’ almost immediately after Molotov’s departure. Both countries were planning to attack each other sooner or later.