RUTHFULLY YOURS

A French national of Chechen origin stabbed a person to death on the streets of central Paris on Saturday evening and wounded four others, in an assault that French investigators were treating as a terrorist attack.

Police shot and killed the man shortly after the attack began, French authorities said.

Paris prosecutor François Molins said the man yelled “Allahu Akbar!”—“God is great” in Arabic—during the stabbing, indicating the attack was the latest in a string of assaults committed by Islamist extremists in France.

A French judicial official said the man had previously been flagged as a potential terror risk in one of France’s security databases, where the government keeps the names of thousands of people who have expressed sympathy for radical Islam.

Islamic State quickly claimed the assault via its Amaq media service, calling the assailant a “soldier” of the extremist group.

The attack took place near the Palais Garnier, the opulent Parisian ballet and opera house, a neighborhood packed with restaurants and bars that was crowded with Saturday evening revelers. Police cordoned off the area for hours, interviewing witnesses and searching for any potential accomplices of the attacker.

The judicial official described the slain assailant as a French citizen who was born in Chechnya, without releasing his name.

France has been on high alert since January 2015 when gunmen killed 17 in the Paris region, including 12 at the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo. In November 2015, a team of militants sent by Islamic State from territory it then controlled in Syria killed 130 people in and around Paris, one of the worst terrorist attacks in European history.

Chechnya, a predominantly Muslim region in the south of Russia, has been a major source of foreign fighters in the ranks of Islamic State. Western security officials have also been concerned about radicalization among Chechens living in Europe and the U.S.CONTINUE AT SITE

The U.S. on Monday will officially open its new embassy to Israel in Jerusalem. This will correct a surreal policy whereby, since Israel’s independence 70 years ago, the U.S. and other nations have refused to recognize its sovereignty over its capital city. President Trump announced in December he would reverse the old policy. By moving the embassy he now translates words into deed.

The embassy’s exact location within Jerusalem has gotten much less attention, but it is equally consequential. It will be housed in buildings used by the American Consulate, as well as in an adjacent former hotel purchased by the State Department in 2014. Most of that complex is located on the far side of the armistice line that divided Jerusalem from 1949 to 1967. Thus the embassy site demonstrates that the U.S. not only sees Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, but also—consistent with bipartisan calls from Congress—recognizes the city as unified.

The “Green Line” was created in the wake of Israel’s 1948-49 War of Independence. Upon the country’s founding, Jordan and its allies invaded, with the goal of preventing the creation of a Jewish state. Although they failed at that goal, the Arab armies did occupy significant territory when the armistice was called, including what is now widely referred to as the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Jordan subsequently expelled all Jews from the areas under its control.

Richard Kemp commanded British forces in Northern Ireland, Afghanistan, Iraq and the Balkans. He has spent time on the Gaza border in recent weeks, observing the Hamas-orchestrated violence and Israeli military reactions.

The true and malevolent purpose of Hamas’s plan is to incite violence in such a way that the IDF has no choice but to respond with lethal force, killing Gaza civilians.

If that happens, the UN and EU, human rights groups and many Western media organizations will have helped bring it about.

The UN, EU and a range of human rights groups and media organizations have devoted their efforts to unjustly condemning Israel’s actions. If there was genuine concern for human life and human rights among these people, rather than a fixation on unfairly vilifying Israel, they would harshly condemn Hamas.

I predict a riot — and much worse. The Palestinian terrorist group Hamas is orchestrating a ‘demonstration’ at the beginning of this week of up to 200,000 people on the Gaza border with Israel, and is intent on turning it into an orgy of death and bloodshed. If that happens, the UN and EU, human rights groups and many Western media organizations will have helped bring it about.

Hamas, which governs the Gaza Strip, is planning the bloody culmination of six weeks of violence along the border that has so far led to the deaths of around 50 of their own people and wounding of hundreds more. Now they intend to pile the bodies higher still, exploiting what they see as a perfect storm. It is the seventieth anniversary of the creation of the modern State of Israel — a date that Palestinians revile as ‘Nakba’ or ‘Catastrophe’ Day. It coincides with the opening of the US embassy in Jerusalem, a move abhorrent to those who consider the existence of the Jewish State illegitimate. And it is the beginning of the Islamic festival of Ramadan, a time when violence throughout the Muslim world often spirals.

Hungary, the Czech Republic and Romania, in coordination with Israel, blocked a joint EU statement criticizing the relocation of the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, Axios.com reported on Friday, quoting sources.

Axios recalls that according to European diplomats and Israeli officials, the draft statement circulated in European capitals had three points:

-Jerusalem should be the capital of both states — Israel and the future state of Palestine.
-The final status of Jerusalem should be negotiated and only determined through negotiations between the parties.
-The member states of the EU will not follow the U.S. and will not move their embassies to Jerusalem.

According to European diplomats and Israeli officials, the French and other member states wanted to publish the statement on Friday as a statement by the EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini supported by all 28 EU members, but Hungary, the Czech Republic and Romania announced they object to the statement and made it impossible to reach the consensus needed to publish it.

“The Hungarians didn’t want to poke Trump in the eye and the Czechs and the Romanians are considering to move their embassies to Jerusalem against the EU position. This is the state of the EU these days,”
a senior diplomat told Axios.

“The essence of propaganda consists in winning people over to an idea so sincerely, so vitally, that in the end they succumb to it utterly and can never escape from it,” said Joseph Goebbels.

Charlie Brown. Lucy. Football.

North Korea says it will blow up the tunnels and dismantle its nuclear test site prior to the Trump-Kim summit later this month

It’s a coup for peace! Trump triumphant! Novus ordo seclorum!

Is it?

AP:

Kim had already revealed plans to shut down the test site by the end of May during his summit with South Korean President Moon Jae-in last month. Analysts say that while the closure of the site is important, it doesn’t represent a material step toward full denuclearization.

“A ceremony for dismantling the nuclear test ground is now scheduled between May 23 and 25,” depending on weather conditions, the Foreign Ministry’s statement said.

It said the North will invite journalists from the United States, South Korea, China, Russia and Britain to witness the dismantling process.

The journalists will be provided with a charter flight from Beijing to the North Korean coastal city of Wonsan, from where they will travel by train to the test site, the statement said.

The ministry said the North will continue to “promote close contacts and dialogue with the neighboring countries and the international society so as to safeguard peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula and over the globe.”

Following the Moon-Kim summit, Moon’s office said Kim was willing to disclose the process to international experts, but the North’s statement Saturday didn’t include any mention about allowing experts on the site.

South Korea had no immediate response to the statement.

There’s a reason they were closing the test site anyway: it’s honeycombed with holes made by nuclear explosions.

Sirwan Kajjo is a Syrian-Kurdish Washington-based journalist and author.

At the onset of the Turkish offensive, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his government declared it a “jihad” against Syrian Kurds. Turkish preachers gave sermons justifying the assault as a “holy war.”

Turkey and jihadist groups are now forcing non-Muslim minorities in Afrin to convert to Islam. Yazidi temples, for example, have been destroyed by militants. Yazidi residents have been forcibly taken to mosques to convert to Islam.

Kurdish groups have accused the government of Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of carrying out a campaign to create a demographic change aiming at dislodging native Kurdish civilians from their lands and replacing them with Sunni Arabs from Turkish-based refugees camps.

After little more than a month since capturing the Kurdish city of Afrin in northwestern Syria, the Turkish government and its jihadist allies are discussing plans to rule the city by Islamic sharia law.

A meeting recently took place between Turkish authorities and rebel leaders of the al-Rahman Legion to decide how to build an Islamic police force, sharia courts and other religious centers.

Al-Rahman Legion is one of the largest Islamist rebel groups that was in control of the eastern Ghouta, the last rebel-held area in Damascus. The group was recently expelled from the area after a Turkish- and Russian-brokered deal between the Syrian regime and groups rebelling against it, such as Al-Rahman. It has since resettled in the city of Afrin, along with hundreds of families from the Damascus suburban area.

Since 2012, Afrin had been run by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), a U.S.-backed group that had a secular system of governance which rejected political Islam and promoted relatively liberal ideals.

No-go zones are growing rapidly in the suburbs of all of France’s main cities. Shanty towns built by illegal migrants from Africa and the Middle East have sprung up in parts of Marseilles and Paris in the last few years. Islamization is everywhere. In hundreds of mosques, imams deliver fiery anti-Western speeches. Churches are vandalized. The number of rapes is rapidly increasing. Groups of veiled women roam the streets and insult the “immodest”, unveiled, women.

Macron’s most important project since he was elected has been the creation of new Islamic institutions destined to adapt France to Islam — not to adapt Islam to France. Many more mosques will be built, financed with taxpayer money; departments of Islamic culture will open in universities, and imam training centers created.

Macron’s main advisor on this subject is Hakim El Karoui, the author of a book (“Islam, a French Religion”) explaining that Islam is now the main religion in the country; that prejudices of non-Muslims are the source of most troubles, and that helping Muslims to have access to more important positions in French society is of the utmost urgency.

Sadly, it will also be difficult for President Macron, Prime Minister May and Chancellor Merkel to hide that they are appeasers of Islam and the weak commanders of countries they are allowing to decay.

During his recent State visit in Washington, French President Emmanuel Macron spoke of the “long friendship” between France and the United States, and tried to present himself as a reliable ally. His statements, essentially empty words, should be taken with extreme caution.

Dr. Majid Rafizadeh, is a business strategist and advisor, Harvard-educated scholar, political scientist, board member of Harvard International Review, and president of the International American Council on the Middle East. He has authored several books on Islam and US Foreign Policy. He can be reached at

Many extremist Muslims believe that their religious desire is coming true in in the US. Religiously speaking, for extremist Muslims, ruling America is Allah’s (God’s) word. To them, a sacred promise is coming to fruition.

What does being the second-largest religion in a country mean? Voters impact local and national politics, swing domestic elections, elect more representatives from the same religious affiliation, are influential enough to determine who the next president of the United States may be, and change the laws of the land.

This sense of immunity and dismissal led to the downfall of many countries throughout time.

“Soon,” said the letter, “America Will Be Ours”.

“Ours?”

The writer, it became clear, was an extremist Muslim in the U.S. who claimed to be a reputable religious preacher. With each new word, concern grew.

He pointed out, throughout the letter, the “sinful” ways of the West: dancing, drinking, dating…

He expressed disgust that most women did not wear the hijab or participate in prayer five times a day. Then he got straight to the point: “Ours,” he explained, represented Muslims like him.

The sentiment is hardly a new one. A person hears similar proclamations from many Muslim extremists throughout the years. The real shock was not letter but the reaction of many Americans after seeing it.

Such a thing, they said, could never happen. The writer’s words were “just bluster,” nothing to be taken seriously. Most surprisingly, they stated — honestly — that Muslims who speak of such intentions do not really mean what they say, so these threats should not be cause for concern.

The history of the two nations where I grew up — Iran and Syria — taught all of us there a big lesson about living in this kind of ignorance: the reality of how quickly a nation can be consumed by the philosophies of a religious state. An authoritarian and malicious regime, as exists now in Iran — the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism and brutal even to its own people — is something we cannot forget.

Our allies are finally becoming force multipliers — joining with America to use its talent and technology finally to defeat the jihadist threat. We should assist and encourage the UAE and Saudi Arabia, not abandon them.

More than 7,000 miles from Washington and far from America’s headlines, a war in Yemen is rewriting America’s strategy against Iran and terrorism.

The three-sided civil war pits two radical Islamist forces — Al-Qaeda’s largest surviving army and Iran’s biggest proxy force — against each other and six of America’s Arab allies. U.S. Special forces carry out covert raids and CIA drones rain down missiles on terror leaders.

The outcome of the Yemen war matters: U.S. forces are fighting there and a new strategy against terrorism is now being tested in the Middle East’s poorest nation.

Since Britain’s Royal Marines marched out of their Aden Protectorate in November 1967, Yemenis have killed each other over nearly every international ideology: colonialism, communism, and radical Islamism. Add in the tribal rivalries and the religious divides between competing versions of Sunni and Shia Islam — and the stage is set for perpetual war. Indeed, Yemen, in every decade since the 1960s, saw bombings, bloodshed and barbarism.

Iran has also seemingly been trying to form a “Shi’ite Crescent” across the Middle East, through Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon to the Mediterranean.

According to nearly half a million computer files released by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency late last year, captured from Osama bin Laden’s compound, Iran had also offered “support to al-Qaeda in exchange for targeting the Gulf.”

In addition, Iran has been sponsoring Shia uprisings in Bahrain. The US ambassador to Bahrain during the Obama administration evidently turned a deaf ear to pleas from Bahraini officials for help; he presumably feared upsetting the president’s Iran deal, just as Obama had, by failing to act after his “red line” on the use of chemical weapons was crossed in Syria.

One of Germany’s leading economists, Hans-Werner Sinn, warned that the migrant crisis could end up costing German taxpayers more than one trillion euros: “The cost to the taxpayer could also be higher. So far, there are about 1.5 million migrants who have come to Germany since 2015. And no: They are not dentists, lawyers and nuclear scientists, but mostly underqualified immigrants, who have arrived in the promised land… where the standard of living without employment is higher than in many countries of origin with employment.”

In his first media interview as the new head of the influential GdP police union in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW), Michael Mertens was asked if there are any no-go zones in NRW, Germany’s most populous state. He replied: “There are areas where police do not go alone, only in large teams. Such areas are now present in almost all NRW cities.

“We now have new phenomenon in having refugees or people of Arab origin who are bringing another form of anti-Semitism back into the country. This dismays us.” — German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

April 1. Senior German officials, including Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, always quick to outdo each other with good wishes for Islamic festivals, failed to greet Germans for Easter, the most important Christian festival. By contrast, Aiman ​​Mazyek, the head of the Central Council of Muslims in Germany, did offer Easter greetings: “I wish you all peaceful and relaxing holidays. Happy Easter to the Christians, a happy ‘Passover’ to the Jews and a few contemplative days to the non-believers. #Variety makes you strong.”

April 2. German churches were sheltering 611 illegal migrants at the end of March, up from 530 at the end of December 2017. Many churches in Germany provide refuge for refugees who face deportation or fear social and psychological hardships. German authorities tolerate church asylum, although there is no legal basis for it, according to the newsmagazine, Focus.

April 4. Sohail A., a 34-year-old rejected Pakistani asylum seeker living in Hamburg, confessed to slitting his two-year-old daughter’s throat with a kitchen knife. Prosecutors said the man murdered his daughter out of “anger and revenge” because the girl’s mother refused to allow the child to be taken to Pakistan.