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CHANGE THE NARRATIVE MR. PRESIDENT: MELANIE PHILLIPS

By on May 13th, 2017

Recent stories about President Trump’s initiatives in the Middle East have been causing consternation among Israel supporters.

First the World Jewish Congress president, Ron Lauder, reportedly told a group of Israeli politicians that the president was confident he could persuade the Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas to make concessions that would renew the peace process.

The only concession that matters, though, is to abandon the Palestinian goal of destroying Israel. That one wouldn’t currently seem to be on the cards.

The next day, Prime Minister Netanyahu was reported to be furious with Lauder for having briefed Abbas before he met President Trump.

Then came a report that the White House had told Netanyahu that Trump had decided not to move the US Embassy to Jerusalem after all. Israel promptly denied this report, saying no such communication from the Trump administration about the embassy move had been received.

These reports may all be fake news. They have deepened nevertheless the mood of nervousness and even despair among Israel supporters after Trump invited Abbas to the White House for what seemed to be a warm and encouraging meeting.http://melaniephillips.com/change-narrative-mr-president/

The Palestinians say they were pleasantly surprised. The London-based Arab newspaper Al-Hayat reported senior Palestinian officials saying Trump might use his upcoming visit to Israel to announce the resumption of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

Israel supporters fear all this suggests Trump is going down the same peace-process rabbit hole as previous administrations.

Such reports, however, should be taken with a large dose of salt. The first relied on what Israelis said Lauder said, which he may or may not have done; Trump may or may not have thought Abbas would make concessions; Netanyahu may or may not have been furious; Trump may or may not be planning a resumed peace process. It’s all spin and hype.

What we do know is this. Trump wants to broker a deal between Israel and the Palestinians, acting as a “mediator, an arbitrator or a facilitator.” He has said so repeatedly.

Ahead of his visit to Israel and the Palestinian Authority later this month, Trump will stop in Saudi Arabia. He wants to show that he respects the Muslim world in order to seek Saudi help in promoting a regional approach to solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and he wants Arab leaders to help pressure Abbas to make concessions.

Well, over the years Palestinian “concessions” have all popped like soap bubbles as soon as they are floated. I am told, however, by those who know the president that he will never, ever betray Israel.

And the fact is that he has set the Palestinians a high bar to jump. They must stop paying terrorists’ families; they must stop teaching their children to hate Jews. And there may be other requirements he will make.

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New Caucus Hoping Trump Announces Embassy Move on Israel Trip By Nicholas Ballasy

By on May 11th, 2017

WASHINGTON – Rep. Bill Johnson (R-Ohio), co-chairman of the new Congressional Israel Victory Caucus, called for the White House to follow through on President Trump’s campaign pledge to move the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

“We’re looking at it very, very strongly. We’re looking at it with great care, great care, believe me,” Trump said in February alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Rep. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.), co-chairman of the caucus, hopes Trump might announce the relocation of the U.S. Embassy during his planned trip to Israel on May 22-23.

“We founded this caucus on one single irrefutable principle and that is, first and foremost, Israel has a fundamental right to exist and defend herself, and that is not negotiable. Israel has been at war with its immediate neighbors over its right to exist as the nation-state of the Jewish people for nearly 70 years, and we believe Israel has been victorious in this war, and that this reality must be recognized in order for any peace to be achieved between Israel and its Palestinian neighbors,” Johnson said during the launch of the caucus at a recent Middle East Forum event on Capitol Hill.

“After eight years of the Obama administration creating uncertainty as to America’s support for our closest ally in the Middle East, I believe it’s important the nation of Israel know she has strong allies both in Congress and now, once again, in the White House,” he added.

Johnson also said the U.S. should send a “strong message” to the Palestinian Authority so they “give up” their goal of “destroying Israel” and “accept its right to exist as the Jewish State.” He also urged the Trump administration to reverse United Nations resolutions that are harmful to Israel and denounce the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement.

Johnson applauded UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, saying she is doing an “exceptional job in reassuring Israel and declaring to the world that America will not stand for one-sided resolutions against our closest friend and ally in the Middle East.”

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The National Security Council’s New Pro-Hamas Israel Advisor The swamp strikes back against Israel and Trump Daniel Greenfield

By on May 10th, 2017

Kris Bauman, the National Security Council’s new point man on Israel, believes that the “Israel Lobby” is a threat, that Israel should be pressured into making concessions to Islamic terrorists and that “the Obama Administration must find creative (but legal) ways to include Hamas in a solution.”

Yael Lempert, Bauman’s predecessor, had been one of the Obama holdovers that conservatives had fought to pry out of the swamp. Lempert had been described as “Obama’s point person in the White House orchestrating his war against Israel.”

Lee Smith wrote that, “Lempert, one former Clinton official told me, ‘is considered one of the harshest critics of Israel on the foreign policy far left. From her position on the Obama NSC, she helped manufacture crisis after crisis in a relentless effort to portray Israel negatively.’”

Lempert’s mother, Lesly Lempert, had been an anti-Israel activist with the misleadingly named American Israeli Civil Liberties Coalition. Yael had carried on her mother’s work. Her departure should have been a victory for conservatives. Instead the swamp was replaced with more swamp.

Kris Bauman had been part of the failed “peace” efforts in the Obama years working for Hillary ally, General Allen. His views on Israel, the PLO and Hamas were those of the Obama-Kerry team. Bauman believes that Israel is at fault for the failure of previous peace efforts and that peace can only be achieved when the United States applies enough pressure on Israel.

It’s like Yael Lempert never left.

Once McMaster took over as National Security Adviser, the swamp was back. McMaster has warned Trump against talking about Islamic terrorism. He had tried to force out Ezra Cohen-Watnick, who played a crucial role in exposing the Obama eavesdropping, and replace him with Linda Weissgold, the director of the CIA’s Office of Terrorism Analysis, who had helped draft the Benghazi talking points which blamed the Islamic terror attack on “protests”.

President Trump overruled McMaster. Just as he had overruled Mattis’ plot to bring in Michele Flournoy, Hillary Clinton’s likely Secretary of Defense, and move Anne Patterson, the Muslim Brotherhood’s favorite State Department hack, in as undersecretary for policy at the Pentagon.

But not every tidal flow of the swamp can be stopped.

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They Want to Kill You By Herbert London

By on May 9th, 2017

Herbert London is Presidentof London Center for Policy Research http://www.londoncenter.org/

In the relentless rush to undermine the Trump administration the Left has adopted the view that the bellicose stance of the president towards North Korea, Iran, and yes, Russia is designed as a distraction. Presumably if one accepts this perverse logic, this hostile rhetoric, missile deployment and movement of military assets are a mere show of force to keep Americans from recognizing the destructive policies being introduced by the newly installed government.

What the president’s foes willfully underestimate is that there are national leaders who want to kill us. North Korea is not simply a police state and a moral outrage, it is an enemy intent on destroying the West. The attempt to develop an ICBM with range sufficient to reach California is an obsessive goal. Recently military forces redirected a North Korean satellite to take a north-south orbit rather than an east-west orbit so that it remains over North America for a longer period. The object is a possible EMP attack on the U.S. thereby paralyzing the nation. Kim Jong Un may be erratic, but he is not completely irrational.

Iran realizes that the United States led by by an assertive national security team is a counter weight to its desire for a Shia empire across the Levant, a reclamation of the Persian empire. After eight years of an Obama led foreign policy that tilted heavily to Iran, a new chapter is emerging in the Middle East that will not serve Iran’s interest. “Death to the Great Devil” is not an empty expression. While the Iranians do not have the capability of attacking the U.S. at the moment, they have been able to obtain North Korean nuclear technology and a deal from President Obama that virtually guarantees nuclear weapons possession some time in the future.

Russian strategy against the U.S. may be more subtle than North Korea and Iran, but it is not less dangerous. The Russians want to encircle American interests by creating a sphere of influence in East Europe and the Middle East. In order to accomplish its goal, it must force the U.S. to retreat from its present positions.

President Trump has his hands full. This is not a distraction, but a reality. The incremental withdrawal of American forces worldwide combined with a naïve belief that nations would rally to create global stabilization, has left foreign policy in tatters.

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The Turkey Trap Erdogan thinks he can blackmail Trump. Kenneth R. Timmerman

By on May 8th, 2017

Turkish autocrat Recep Tayyip Erdogan is coming to Washington, DC, on May 16 loaded for bear.

He has an ambitious agenda and apparently feels he can achieve it all because he holds “trump” cards against the President of the United States.

Erdogan and his proxies have publicly said they want to convince the United States to jettison its budding alliance with the Syrian Democratic Union (PYD) and its armed wing, the People’s Protection Units (YPG), the Kurdish group that has become the tip of the spear in the fight against ISIS in Syria.

On this point, they will encounter resistance from the U.S. military, which sent a U.S. U.S. Marines Stryker group into northern Syria recently to serve as a buffer between Turkish and Kurdish forces after the Turkish air force conducted air strikes that killed twenty of the U.S.-backed Kurdish fighters.

Erdogan can be expected once again to trot out “evidence” that the Syrian Kurds and their Iranian allies, known as PJAK, are puppets of the PKK, the Kurdish group that waged war against the Turkish state for 15 years before entering into negotiations in 1999.

Both the United States and the European Union consider the PKK a terrorist organization, while recognizing that the Syrian and Iranian Kurds have separate command structures. Neither the YPG nor PJAK has joined the PKK in military operations inside Turkey.

But Erdogan has more on his agenda than Kurds and Syria. He is also seeking the extradition to Turkey of former ally-turned-arch political rival, Islamist cleric Fetullah Gulen, who fled Turkey for Pennsylvania in 1999.

Erdogan accuses Gulen of having masterminded the failed July 2016 coup against him, a claim the cleric denies. Critics of the Turkish president who are not allied with Gulen have questioned the authenticity of the coup, citing the professionalism of previous coups by the Turkish military and the amateur nature of last year’s attempt.

This won’t be the first time Erdogan has demanded that the U.S. extradite Gulen, whom he has taken to calling the head of “FETO” – the Fethullah Terrorist Organization.

Since the botched coup, Erdogan and his strongmen have conducted sweeping purges of the military, police, criminal justice and even education system, firing more than 120,000 suspected Gulen supporters and arresting more than 40,000. Erdogan called the failed coup a “gift from God.” Indeed.

Many of those arrested have been accused of being “terrorists” because they were caught in possession of U.S. one dollar bills, which Erdogan claims Gulen supporters use as a “secret signal” to identify themselves to one other.

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Trump Falls Down ‘Peace Process’ Rabbit Hole By Avner Zarmi

By on May 5th, 2017

The chimerical prospect of peace in the Middle East, which has eluded every well-meaning American president since the founding of Israel in 1948, has now claimed its latest victim.

President Trump has met with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. (Their joint press conference can be seen here.)

Abbas has signed a declaration of principles which is as meaningless as any other declaration of principles signed by Palestinian leaders, and has been allowed to engage in the same meaningless rhetoric which has characterized the “peace process” since it began in 1993.

Immediately after the announcement, two things occurred which guarantee the failure of any new peace initiative. First, Abbas’ empty rhetoric about seeking peace based on the “two-state solution” was immediately denounced by Hamas, the governing party in the Gaza Strip. Second, and equally predictive of failure, was the denunciation of any attempt to reopen negotiations with the Palestinians by members of Israel’s HaBayit haYehudi party. The defection of this party would topple the current governing coalition, leading to new elections in which the alignment might be quite different than it is now.

A recent poll shows the following results for parties currently represented in the Knesset: Yesh Atid, 25; Likud, 23; HaBayit haYehudi, 13; Joint List (Arab), 13; Zionist Camp, 11; Yahaduth haTorah, 9; Kulanu, 7; Shas, 6; Yisrael Beytenu, 7; Meretz, 6.

Either a coalition would be formed with Yesh Atid’s head, Ya’ir Lapid, as prime minister, with unpredictable results, or (more likely) an even more right-wing coalition than at present would result, with a weaker Likud and a much larger Bayit Yehudi faction than now.

For comparison purposes, the current coalition is: Likud, 30; Kulanu, 10; HaBayit haYehudi, 8; Shas, 7; Yahadut haTorah, 6; Yisrael Beytenu, 6.

Abbas, in his remarks, demands “peace” on the basis of the “two-state solution” with Israel’s withdrawal to the 1967 borders and a Palestinian capital in Eastern Jerusalem. This completely ignores that, according to current Israeli census figures, there are now 406,302 Jewish Israelis residing in the West Bank. They are not all going to be evacuated; it simply isn’t going to happen.

Another factor is the mendacity of Abbas’ speech. He asserts, for instance, that Palestinian Arab children are being raised with the desire for peace with Israel. This is outrageously false. Cartoons on PA television encourage children to aspire to kill Jews. Killing Jews is a regular topic of sermons in mosques and on radio and television broadcasts. No Arab leader has been willing to prepare the Palestinian Arabs for the painful compromises a real peace solution would entail. Palestinians have been encouraged always to take maximalist positions concerning Arab refugees and their descendants in the camps, and concerning the use of violence and terror. There are near daily reports of stabbings and attempts to murder with vehicles.

To show how convoluted the path toward this “peace” is, consider one major point which Mr. Trump raised with Abbas — that he pays salaries to terrorists.

For years, the PA has been paying terrorists salaries to conduct attacks in Israel, and has been paying the families of terrorists who are killed or captured and imprisoned by Israel.

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Tillerson Points to Shift in U.S. Foreign Policy Priorities U.S. Secretary of State says nation will emphasize national security, economic interests over human rights in its tiesBy Felicia Schwartz

By on May 4th, 2017

WASHINGTON—Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the U.S. will pursue national security and economic interests before turning to human rights concerns in its relationships with other countries, signalling a shift in Washington’s global outlook.

Mr. Tillerson’s remarks, to U.S. diplomats and employees at the State Department on Wednesday, amounted to the clearest expression yet of President Donald Trump’s “America First” foreign policy doctrine, in which the U.S. won’t condition its approach to other countries based on “how they treat people,” he said.

“We really have to understand, in each country or each region of the world that we’re dealing with, what are our national security interests, what are our economic prosperity interests, and then, as we can advocate and advance our values, we should,” he said.

In separating U.S. policies from values such as human rights, democracy, press freedom and the treatment of minorities, Mr. Tillerson appeared to outline a departure from priorities pursued during both the Bush and Obama administrations.

Since taking office, Mr. Trump has sought to strengthen ties with leaders who have drawn criticism for their human rights records. He hosted Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi last month at the White House for his first state visit since he took power in 2014 and has invited the Philippines’ President Rodrigo Duterte to Washington.

Human rights groups and some lawmakers have raised concerns about what they’ve described as a U.S. turn away from an emphasis on human rights and basic freedoms. On Wednesday, Amnesty International USA director Margaret Huang said the Trump administration is “literally trying to erase human rights before our own eyes.”

But Mr. Tillerson said emphasizing rights can impede other imperatives. CONTINUE AT SITE

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Trump Meets Abbas, Says of Peace: ‘We Will Get It Done’ In meeting with the Palestinian leader, the president says the U.S. would serve as a mediator By Carol E. Lee and Rory Jones in Tel Aviv See note

By on May 4th, 2017

OH PULEEZ! BACK TO THE SWAMP OF FAILED POLICIES WHICH ONLY ENCOURAGE AND RATCHET UP ARAB DEMANDS FOR THE SLOWER BUT SURER ERADICATION OF ISRAEL……RSK

President Donald Trump raised expectations for a peace agreement between Israelis and Palestinians as he met with Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday, saying he would do whatever is necessary to broker a deal and pledging, “We will get it done.”

Mr. Trump was dismissive of the notion that a foreign-policy knot that has vexed his predecessors for decades is the “toughest deal to make.” He said he hoped to invite Mr. Abbas back to the White House to mark progress in an effort that Mr. Trump’s administration has been working on only for a few months.

“Let’s see if we can find the solution,” Mr. Trump said. “It’s something that I think is, frankly, maybe not as difficult as people have thought over the years.”

Mr. Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority, which rules the West Bank, said he looked forward to working with Mr. Trump to achieve a “historic deal to bring about peace.” But his remarks also underscored challenges faced by the effort. Palestinians, he said, are “the only remaining people in the world that still live under occupation,” a term Israeli officials dislike.

Mr. Trump’s confidence drew skepticism, as former Israeli-Palestinian mediators believe the two sides are as far apart as they have ever been.

“I’m an optimist by nature. But goodness gracious!” Daniel Shapiro, former U.S. ambassador to Israel in the Obama administration, tweeted from his official account in response to Mr. Trump’s comments.

Fundamental differences between Israelis and Palestinians have prevented a peace deal from being reached for decades. “In my mind, as someone that has worked on this for the last 30 years, I don’t think we have ever been at a lower point,” Dennis Ross, former peace negotiator for multiple U.S. administrations, said Monday. “The level of disbelief between the two sides has never been greater.”

White House press secretary Sean Spicer argued that the difference between previous attempts to reach a peace deal and the one undertaken by the Trump administration is “the man.” He said Mr. Trump’s style of building relationships with world leaders gives the process more of a chance for success.

Under Mr. Trump, the U.S. has smoothed over ties with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that had become strained during former President Barack Obama’s time in office.

Mr. Trump also is considering moving the U.S. embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a move that would be welcomed by Israelis as effectively recognizing the city as their capital.​Palestinians have said the status of Jerusalem should be determined in negotiations.

However, Mr. Trump also has made clear that it is up to the Israelis and Palestinians to reach a peace deal, and was harshly critical of Mr. Obama for trying to pressure the Israelis into policy concessions.

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2 US B-1 bombers complete joint drill over Korean Peninsula

By on May 3rd, 2017

As tensions continue to rise between the U.S. and North Korea, so has American military presence in the region.

The Air Force says two U.S. B-1 bombers completed a joint drill with South Korea and Japan over the Korean Peninsula on Monday. In a separate drill, two other bombers flew over South Korea on April 26th.

CNN is reporting that both missions were long planned, and that the U.S. wanted to keep the drills low profile.The North, however, says the U.S. is intentionally starting a military provocation. A state-run broadcaster in North Korea says American actions are getting to a point close to nuclear war.

South Korea says the U.S. bombers were put in place as a response to the North’s nuclear missile threat.

This comes a day after President Trump said he would be open to meeting with Kim Jong Un under the right circumstances.

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North Korean Crisis Continues to Sizzle While tensions rise, the Iran connection is overlooked. Joseph Klein

By on May 2nd, 2017

North Korea continues to hold the foreign policy crisis spotlight. The rogue regime tested yet another missile on Saturday, which failed like the previous attempted launch. Unbowed, North Korea threatened to carry out a nuclear test “at any time and at any location” its leaders choose to do so. “The DPRK’s measures for bolstering the nuclear force to the maximum will be taken in a consecutive and successive way at any moment and any place decided by its supreme leadership,” a spokesman for the North Korean foreign ministry declared, using the acronym for the regime’s formal name, the Democratic Republic of Korea. When President Trump was asked during his “Face the Nation” interview, which aired on Sunday, how he would react to a sixth nuclear test by North Korea, he replied, “I would not be happy.” In response to a follow-up question whether being unhappy meant “military action,” President Trump, as usual, kept his options open. “I don’t know. I mean, we’ll see,” he said.

The weekend drama followed an open ministerial level meeting of the United Nations Security Council last Friday on the North Korean situation, presided over by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. Secretary Tillerson made clear that all options remained on the table, including military action if necessary. However, the bulk of his address was devoted to urging all members of the international community to tighten the economic and diplomatic screws on North Korea in order to increase its isolation.

“For too long, the international community has been reactive in addressing North Korea,” Secretary Tillerson said. “Those days must come to an end. Failing to act now on the most pressing security issue in the world may bring catastrophic consequences.” Talks are out of the question, he added, until North Korea decides to “take concrete steps to reduce the threat that its illegal weapons programs pose to the United States and our allies.” This means not just a nuclear and missile freeze, which is something China has proposed in exchange for a freeze on major military exercises in the region by the United States and South Korea. The Trump administration will be looking for evidence that North Korea is actually beginning “to dismantle its nuclear weapons and missile technology programs.” That is highly unlikely, however, as the regime sees its survival depending on its ability to project a credible nuclear threat against its enemies, particularly the United States.

The Trump administration has tried to distinguish its policy of “urgency” with the failed “strategic patience” approach of the Obama administration. What that means in practical terms is three-fold.

First, tighten enforcement of existing UN sanctions and ramp up the sanctions both at the UN and unilaterally. “We must levy new sanctions on DPRK entities and individuals supporting its weapons and missile programs, and tighten those already in place,” Secretary Tillerson told the Security Council. “The United States also would much prefer countries and people in question own up to their lapses and correct their behavior themselves, but we will not hesitate to sanction third country entities and individuals supporting the DPRK’s illegal activities.”

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