RUTHFULLY YOURS

A few days ago, Turkey hosted something called the World Humanitarian Summit, shortly after its parliament passed a bill that would allow its government to lift parliamentary immunity and throw in jail members of parliament whose opinions do not agree with those of its increasingly dictatorial Islamist president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. This puts paid to any remaining pretensions Turkey had of being a democracy and guarantees that this NATO member is headed for disaster. To understand why this is now inevitable, a closer look at this pernicious bill and the background to it are needed.

After coming to power with a huge majority in 2003, Erdoğan, who never hid his ultimate intentions to pursue the radical Islamization of Turkey, introduced a number of policies that were well received. One of them was to enter into reconciliation talks with the large Kurdish minority and the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) representing it, which had been the key factor motivating the bloody Kurdish insurrection that claimed 40,000 victims in the 1980s and 1990s. Two of these policies, the ability to use the Kurdish language and elect their own mayors in the vast Kurd-dominated southeastern part of Turkey, were particularly popular, and the PKK unilaterally declared cease-fire in March 2013 after months of negotiations between Ankara and jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan.

In the meantime, however, the geopolitical circumstances of the large Kurdish minorities in the region had changed dramatically, encouraging greater strivings for autonomy. The Kurds in northern Iraq had de facto become independent and had also distinguished themselves as the only military force capable of standing up to ISIS. Something similar happened in northern Syria, where Bashar Assad withdrew his forces early on and the majority-Kurdish areas also became autonomous, as well as the main opponent of the Islamic State terrorists, who were tacitly or directly supported by Erdoğan.

Erdoğan’s relations with the Kurds took a turn for the worst with the siege of the Kurdish-Syrian town of Kobani and the occupation of 350 Kurdish villages by ISIS terrorists in September 2014. Ankara’s failure to come to the assistance of Kobani triggered violent anti-government riots across the Kurdish areas in Turkey that were brutally put down and poisoned relations further. The end of the efforts at reconciliation came after the parliamentary elections in June of 2015, when the Kurdish party, HDP, received over 13% of the vote and not only entered parliament, but denied parliamentary majority to Erdoğan’s AKP.

In Pakistan, a Muslim suicide bomber murdered 74 people — mostly Christians — and injured nearly 400 more, on Easter Sunday, March 27, 2016.

The U.S. and British governments knew the exact location of many of the Nigerian Christian girls captured by Boko Haram, but failed to launch a rescue mission, according to Andrew Pocock, the former British high commissioner to Nigeria.

In Uganda, Amina Napiya’s 13-year-old daughter was raped while fetching firewood near their home. The rapist told the girl, “this is the second warning to your mother for disgracing the faith of the Muslims.” Napiya, a 42-year-old widow, converted to Christianity in 2014.

Approximately 700 Christian girls are kidnapped and forced into Islamic marriages every year in Pakistan.

On Easter Sunday in Pakistan, March 27, a suicide bombing took place near the children’s rides of a public park, where Christians were known to be celebrating the resurrection of their Lord. At least 74 people — mostly women and children — were killed and nearly 400 injured. “There was human flesh on the walls of our house,” a witness recalled.

“We claim responsibility for the attack on Christians as they were celebrating Easter,” said a group affiliated with the Taliban. In a media statement, the group’s spokesman said it had “deliberately targeted the Christian community.” “We had been waiting for this occasion,” he said.

Click here, here, here, here, and here, for more examples of lethal attacks, worldwide, on Christians celebrating their holidays who also “had been waiting for this occasion.” Even “the terror cell that struck in Brussels in March, killing 34 was planning to massacre worshippers at Easter church services across Europe, including Britain, intelligence chiefs believe, according to a report.

In Scotland, a Muslim man stabbed another Muslim man to death for wishing Christians a Happy Easter. Asad Shah had posted messages on Facebook that said “Good Friday and very happy Easter, especially to my beloved Christian nation” and “Let’s follow the real footstep of beloved holy Jesus Christ and get the real success in both worlds.” Police said a 32-year-old Muslim man was arrested in connection with Shah’s death, and confirmed that the attack was “religiously prejudiced.” Islamic law (Qur’an 5:52) forbids Muslims from participating in or congratulating non-Muslims for their religious holidays as doing so implicitly validates other religions.

A Muslim nanny in Russia beheaded a 4-year-old girl, Anastasia, whom she had been taking care of for the last three years. Gulchehra Bobokulova, a Chechen, went to a Moscow metro station and, for 20 minutes, waved the child’s severed head while screaming “Allahu Akbar” [“Allah is Greatest”]. After her arrest, she said the murder “was what Allah ordered.” In the months before the slaughter, Bobokulova was said to have become “more religious.” She began wearing a hijab, and telling her son to pray five times a day and live in accord with Sharia [Islamic law]. Authorities concluded that, as she is “insane,” she will not face a murder trial.

A 70-year-old Christian woman was stripped naked, savagely beaten, and paraded in the streets of Egypt to jeers, whistles, and yells of “Allahu Akbar” after a mob of some 300 Muslim men descended on her house.

Her crime? Her son is falsely accused of having a romantic relationship with a Muslim woman, which is banned by Islamic law, or sharia – the same body of teachings that prescribes the collective punishment of non-Muslim “infidels.” Seven other Christian homes were also torched by the mob.

The attacks occurred in Minya, Upper Egypt, on May 20, a Friday – the one day of the week when Muslims congregate in mosques and listen to sermons, and the one day of the week when most Muslim mob attacks on Christians occur.

While on the ground being kicked, cursed, and spat upon, Sa’d Thabet, the Christian grandmother, managed to slide herself underneath a wagon. While hidden there, an unidentified woman slipped her some garments, and the traumatized woman eventually managed to escape.

“I never saw the woman who covered me and don’t know how I survived,” she said during a closed meeting with some clergymen of the Coptic Christian Orthodox Church. They testified that her body was covered with wounds, adding that “though she is strong, it is sometimes hard for her to speak; she’s always fighting back tears and sometimes breaks down.”

Prior to the attack on Thabet, her household had been receiving threats for some time. On the morning of the assault, some of the home’s property was stolen and vandalized. She and her husband went to local police, who responded by threatening them and kicking them out of the station. A few hours later, around 8 pm, the attack occurred. It took the same local police over two hours to appear, by which time the “avenged” Muslim mob had dispersed.

When asked why she reported the incident four days after it happened, Thabet said: “I tried to hide and suppress what happened, but I could only take the feelings of humiliation and oppression for four days, at which point I decided to return to the local police station and testify about what happened to me before those who had refused to hear me.”

Europe is rife with anti-Semitism, sometimes disguised as “dissent” on Israel- but increasingly unsheathed as primitive atavistic hatred of Jews….rsk

“As a Catholic, as an Englishman, as a civilised human being, I feel a profound sense of responsibility towards the Jewish people as a whole, but towards my Jewish compatriots in particular. Preserving the Jewish presence in our midst is as much a solemn duty for our generation as it was for our parents and grandparents, who fought to defeat the Nazis. As the last survivors of the Holocaust and the last exiles and émigrés pass away, we must take over their role as witnesses to the truth and guardians of that moral obligation. Never again should Jews have to live in fear among us. Never again should Jews feel that their loyalty is distrusted. Never again should they lack a state that is theirs, living in peace and security within recognised borders. Britain’s commitment to defend Israel’s right, not merely to exist, but to flourish, should be especially strong: it was, after all, the Balfour Declaration that brought the Jewish homeland back to life. Britain did not cover itself with glory during the Mandate period, but we do have a chance to redeem ourselves today by standing up for Israel at the UN and other international bodies, as our Anglophone cousins in Canada, Australia and the United States generally do. When Israel responded to attacks from Gaza last year by destroying the ability of Hamas to launch missiles and use tunnels to infiltrate Israel, the Prime Minister refused to join in the chorus of condemnation. Like Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair, David Cameron has proved himself a friend of Israel. If only the rest of Europe could say the same.”
“Anti-Semitism is a very ancient and a thoroughly modern phenomenon: it was as common among ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans as it is among their present-day successor states. It constantly mutates: Christian anti-Judaism became right-wing anti-Semitism and now left-wing anti-Zionism. Those who wish to resist and if possible destroy its roots must also adapt to the moving target.

Take, for example, the case of Karel De Gucht. He is a leading Belgian liberal politician, who served as foreign minister and then as a European Union commissioner from 2009 to 2014, responsible for aid and trade. Two of the Belgian prime ministers under whom he served, Guy Verhofstadt and Herman Van Rompuy, also became high EU officials and it is fair to assume that De Gucht’s outlook is typical of the European political elite.

Yet in 2010, this supposedly liberal representative of this supposedly liberal union of supposedly liberal nations told Belgian radio: “Don’t underestimate the opinion . . . of the average Jew outside Israel. There is indeed a belief — it’s difficult to describe it otherwise — among most Jews that they are right. And a belief is something that’s difficult to counter with rational arguments. And it’s not so much whether these are religious Jews or not. Lay Jews also share the same belief that they are right. So it is not easy to have, even with moderate Jews, a rational discussion about what is actually happening in the Middle East.” Washington was controlled by Jews, De Gucht declared, even in the Obama era: “Do not underestimate the Jewish lobby on Capitol Hill. That is the best organised lobby, you shouldn’t underestimate the grip it has on American politics — no matter whether it’s Republicans or Democrats.”

It is not a secret that democracy can be used to abolish democracy.

It may have finally begun to dawn on the people that Swedish Sweden will soon be lost forever, and in many areas replaced by a Middle Eastern state of affairs, where different immigrant groups (mainly Muslims) make war on each other as well as on the Swedes.

According to Dr. Peter Hammond, in his book Slavery, Terrorism and Islam: The Historical Roots and Contemporary Threat, the goal of Islam is not to convert the whole world, but rather, to establish sharia law all over the world.

There is no country where Islam is dominant that can be considered a democracy with freedom of speech and equal justice under law.

In Sweden’s last census in which citizens were asked about their religious beliefs, in 1930, fifteen people said that they were Muslims. Since 1975, when Sweden started its transformation from a homogenous, Swedish country into a multicultural and multi-religious one, the number of Muslims has exploded. Now, approximately one million Muslims live here — Sunni, Shia and Ahmadiyya from all the corners of the world — and Mosques are built and planned all over the country.

No one, however, seems to have asked the crucial question upon which Sweden’s future depends: Is Islam compatible with democracy?

SÃO PAULO––A group of 150 health experts have published an open letter calling for the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro to be delayed or moved to another location because of the threat posed to public health by the Zika virus.

The letter, addressed to World Health Organization Director-General Dr. Margaret Chan, says there is still much to be learned about the effects of the virus, and that half a million foreign tourists attending the Games this August risk spreading it around the world.

“The Brazilian strain of Zika virus harms health in ways that science has not observed before,” the letter said. “It is unethical to run the risk, just for Games that could proceed anyway, if postponed and/or moved.”

The virus is contracted from mosquitoes and spread between humans through sexual transmission, and infections have increased rapidly across Brazil in recent months. According to the letter, which was signed by epidemiologist John Last, mosquito expert Donald Roberts, and former White House science adviser Philip Rubin, among others, cases of the disease in Rio de Janeiro have more than quadrupled in January through April of this year compared with the same period last year.

In most people, the virus can cause a fever, a rash, joint pain and red eyes. But researchers say it can cause a condition known as microcephaly, a condition characterized by a small head and brain abnormalities, in babies born to infected women. Doctors are now discovering that some of those babies suffer from much worse birth defects than previously associated with microcephaly.

The World Health Organization issued a statement after the publication of the letter, saying “canceling or changing the location of the 2016 Olympics will not significantly alter the international spread of Zika virus,” and instead recommending that travelers follow public health advice.

The WHO recommends pregnant women not travel to areas with ongoing Zika virus transmission, that people traveling to such areas protect themselves with mosquito repellent and clothes that cover as much of the body as possible, that travelers stay in air-conditioned accommodations to further avoid mosquitoes, and that they stay away from areas with no piped water and poor sanitation. CONTINUE AT SITE

Vladimir Putin’s intervention in Syria caught many by surprise, but it is a return to Russian geopolitical aspirations that stretch back to the czars.

Every Russian schoolchild is taught about the violent death of Aleksandr Griboyedov in 1829. A poet and playwright whose work is enshrined in the country’s literary canon, Griboyedov had the misfortune to be Czar Nicholas I’s ambassador to Tehran in the wake of Persia’s humiliating loss of territory to Moscow’s spreading empire. A Tehran mob, furious at the czar and his infidel representatives, stormed the embassy, slaughtering the unlucky ambassador and 36 other Russian diplomatic staff.

A century and a half later, in 1979, those events were almost replayed in Iran (as Persia is now known). When five leaders of the Iranian revolutionary students gathered in Tehran to decide which foreign embassy to target, two of them advocated seizing the Soviet legation. They were persuaded instead to overrun the U.S. embassy, creating a no less historic trauma for another world power entangled in the politics of the Middle East.
Russia’s long history of involvement—and warfare—in the region is largely unknown to Westerners, but it helps to explain President Vladimir Putin’s decision last fall to intervene in Syria’s civil war. Mr. Putin’s gambit on behalf of the Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad caught many in the West by surprise. Critics have assailed it as a miscalculated bid to replace the U.S. as the dominant outside power in the region.

But when viewed from Moscow, Mr. Putin’s Middle Eastern adventure looks like something very different: an overdue return to geopolitical aspirations that stretch back not only to the Soviet era but to centuries of czarist rule. “The Middle East is a way to showcase that the period of Russia’s absence from the international scene as a first-rate state has ended,” said Fyodor Lukyanov, the head of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy in Moscow, which advises the Kremlin and other government institutions.

Last week, a mob of 300 Muslim men in southern Egypt stripped a 70-year-old Christian woman naked and paraded her through the streets.This Islamist atrocity came a few days before an EgyptAir flight from Paris exploded in the skies near Alexandria. It was the second passenger jet bombed by jihadists in Egypt in recent months.

Egypt is hanging on by a thread. Like the attack that downed a Russian passenger jet over Sinai last October, this week’s attack is likely the work of an Egyptian airport employee. It is yet more proof that nearly three years after the military deposed the Muslim Brotherhood’s jihadist government, the Brotherhood’s supporters remain seeded throughout the country and are capable of threatening the regime and the very survival of the Egyptian state.

It isn’t in the least surprising that Islamists have this power. Most Egyptians support them.

In the parliamentary elections four-and-a-half years ago, Islamists won more than 65 percent of the vote. Those were the most open elections in Egyptian history.

Given their strength, it is far from certain that President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi will long succeed in preventing the most powerful and populous country in the Arab world from becoming another branch of Islamic State.

From Israel’s perspective, how this battle pans out is of pivotal importance. But you wouldn’t know it from the media – or from our national security leaders.

As far as they are concerned, the gravest threat facing Israel is the Israeli Right. From their perspective, the most significant development of the year was Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s decision to appoint Avigdor Liberman to replace Moshe Ya’alon as defense minister.

If victims of Islamic terrorism could ever be killed twice, then a Danish art exhibition, scheduled to open this week in Copenhagen, could probably achieve this very dubious distinction.
The art show in question has as its theme the motive of martyrs, namely, “why some people die for that which they believe in.”

“Our exhibition is about describing the term ‘martyr’ from as many different angles as possible and through history,” said a show organizer.

So far so good.

But what has outraged many is that the leftist artist collective (no surprise here) responsible for the exhibition has decided to include Islamic terrorists involved in the Paris attack last November as well as in the Brussels suicide bombings alongside “historical figures considered martyrs” such as Joan of Arc and Aristotle.

“[The] Danish artists plan to include images of the terrorists, replicas of their belongings and, and plaques explaining who they were and what they did,” reports the CopenhagenPost.

Besides representing a posthumous execution of the Brussels and Paris victims, this obscenity disguised as ‘art’ is also just another indicator to what depths of decadence and immorality the left has descended to. Its belief that every taboo must be broken for freedom to exist is also currently reflected in the trans-gender washroom controversy in America.

The following quote by a female member of the collective disturbingly indicates the left’s unnatural loss of all sense of proportion, possessed by most normal people, when it comes to recognising the difference between good and evil:

“To fly into the Twin Towers, to shoot at people in Bataclan, or to blow oneself up into the air, one does this only in the belief in a better, world.”

Stalin and Hitler also believed in better worlds. The former of a world with a single ruling class, and the latter with a single ruling race. Millions perished unwillingly in the attempt to realize these unrealizable, homicidal visions.

Unfortunately for most sane people in the West, the unnamed ‘artiste’ is not alone in her twisted thinking. In America, Professor Ward Churchill called the World Trade Tower victims “little Eichmanns”. And in the same vein, the German columnist, Henryk Broder, cites the composer Karlheinz Stockhausen who called 9/11 “the greatest work of art there is in the universe.” He also quotes the painter Anselm Kiefer who said that with 9/11, Osama bin Laden “created the most perfect picture that we have seen since the steps of the first man on the moon.”

Broder also points out what is most obviously wrong with this art exhibition, which should be evident to anyone possessing even a modicum of rational thought: the Islamic terrorists, who calmly shot people down at the Bataclan in Paris and blew up dozens more in Brussels, including themselves, are not martyrs but mass murderers.

And unlike Joan of Arc and Aristotle, these killers did not go alone to their deaths but dragged several hundred unwilling victims with them. These two outstanding heroes of Western civilization would never have wanted to see anyone executed for their sake or because of their actions. Besides, they did not seek death and ‘martyrdom’, like Islamic jihadists do, but rather were sentenced to die after dubious trials.

“Why didn’t the Paris attackers, who caused the bloodbath in Bataclan, instead throw themselves down from the Arc de Triomphe?” asks Broder.

The first question anyone should ask is: Who invited this “Salafist megastar,” who denies the Holocaust and is known for making anti-Semitic statements, to visit Malmö?

What do you do when anti-Semitism in Sweden’s third largest city is so normalized that children in a public school can endorse a conference with anti-Semitic elements?

Antisemitism, is, in fact, such a gigantic problem in Malmö that even senior politicians and officials in Malmö cannot understand how it became so normalized. They seem to dismiss it as part of a non-Swedish culture that, in a multicultural society, must be tolerated, even accommodated.

If there are children in Swedish public schools today who are promoting an anti-Semitic conference, what will these children do in the future?

Is Sweden really turning into a country where Jews are no longer welcome, someday to become a country without Jews? And if that happens, what does that say about Sweden? And about who will come next after the Jews?

Malmö, Sweden’s third largest city is an important, visible part of Sweden. If you read the Municipality of Malmö’s political objectives, which the Municipal Council of Malmö has endorsed, you will see that “racism, discrimination and hate crimes do not belong in open Malmö.” The reality, however, is different. Antisemitism there has reached bizarre levels — with politicians and other policymakers in Sweden doing nothing about it.