Withholding Weapons from Israel Makes the US Weak Shoshana Bryen

https://www.jewishpolicycenter.org/insight/

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and a group of like-minded colleagues want to sink the proposed $735-million sale of a Boeing-built arms guidance kit to Israel.  The Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAM) kit converts unguided or “dumb” bombs into precision-guided munitions.  The goal, according to Politico, is “leverage to push the Israelis to drop their resistance to a ceasefire.”

In fact, Israel’s resistance is not to a ceasefire, but to the continued rocket attacks by Hamas into Israeli civilian centers.  The Biden administration has no leverage at all with Hamas and is pushing desperately for an Iran deal, which precludes asking Iran to rein in its Hamas terror-proxy.  For America to consider punishing Israel is nasty at best and counterproductive of AOC’s stated goal at worst.  Would she prefer that Israel use “dumb” bombs to defend itself and its people?

We’ve seen this before.

In 2009, Barak Obama’s administration blocked delivery of six Apache helicopters to Israel on the grounds that Israel might use them in Gaza.

During Israel’s 2014 response to Hamas rockets and mortars fired into Israel, President Obama accused Israel of “heavy-handed battlefield tactics” and halted the supply of Hellfire missiles.  Military equipment supplied to Israel would also have to be vetted individually in the White House instead of shipped by the Pentagon according to prior agreements.  The irony of withholding precision missiles — precision being the operative word — was lost on the White House.

The Squad Enables Pelosi’s Massive Capitol Police Spending Bill While Cynically Feigning Opposition Three Squad members — all of whom recently chanted “Defund the Police” — had the power to kill a $1.9 billion increase in Capitol Police and security spending. Instead, they ensured its passage. Glenn Greenwald

https://greenwald.substack.com/p/the-squad-enables-pelosis-massive?token=e

By a margin of one vote, the U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday approved a bill that allocates $1.9 billion to intensify security and increase policing at the U.S. Capitol. Among other things, the bill would boost armed security for members of Congress, fortify security protections at the Capitol, provide funds in “reimbursement” to the National Guard, and increase funding for the Capitol Police. A small portion of it would provide counseling services to Capitol Police officers dealing with trauma.

The 213-212 vote was a party line vote with six exceptions. All Republicans voted against it. All Democrats voted for the bill except for six. Three members of the left-wing faction of the House known as the “Squad” joined their GOP colleagues to vote against the bill: Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO), and Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA). But the other three members of the Squad — Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) and Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) — voted neither “yes” nor “no” but rather “present.” All six had previously told activist groups that they opposed the bill.

Europe: Anti-Israel Protests Descend into Anti-Semitism by Soeren Kern

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17389/europe-anti-semitism-protests

The current crisis of anti-Semitism is a testament to the failure of European multiculturalism, which is making Jewish life in Europe increasingly unviable.

“Open, disgusting hatred of Jews and Israel, but not only: It was also hatred of our free, tolerant democracy.” — Peter Wilke, correspondent, Bild.

“It is astonishing that, only 76 years after the Shoah, many people fail to understand that the Jewish state cannot accept a threat to its existence without being able to defend itself. The anti-Semitic attacks of the past few days have once again made it clear how fragile Jewish life is in Germany.” — Andrei Kovacs, managing director, “321-2021: 1700 Years of Jewish Life in Germany.”

“Angela Merkel’s refugee policy, which no longer bothers to identify true war refugees, has imported hundreds of thousands of times an ideology that focuses on the Jew as an eternal enemy… Too many streets were in the hands of people at the weekend who want a different Germany, a country without Jews.” — Julian Reichelt, editor-in-chief, Bild.

“A large part of this mob consists of people who came here as refugees and brought their hatred of Jews with them and continued to expand it here.” — Michal Kornblum, German commentator.

“German politicians have not understood that immigration from Iraq and Syria, from the Arab countries, also brings more anti-Semitism to Germany. Anyone who says that is immediately branded as right wing and there is no fair discussion or debate about it.” — German-Egyptian political scientist and author Hamed Abdel-Samad, Die Welt.

“In the end, not even schools can talk about anti-Semitism or the Middle East conflict. Or about Erdogan or about Islamism. Even at universities, Muslim students refuse to speak about such topics. Universities should be a safe haven for opinions. But for many Muslim students, universities are now safe spaces from opinions and criticism, even though that is where we have to start.” — German-Egyptian political scientist and author Hamed Abdel-Samad, Die Welt.

“This isn’t about Gaza. We’ve never seen such hate after any Western action in Syria or Afghanistan. No British crowds marching through malls to protest airstrikes in Iraq. This is bigotry in its most ugly, rawest form. Gaza is an excuse to find a socially acceptable way to publicly express Jew-hatred while pretending that your hate is righteous…. Arab persecution of Palestinians is ignored by the anti-Israel crowd as well.” — Elder of Zion blog.

Pro-Palestinian demonstrations in cities across Europe have descended into unrestrained orgies of anti-Semitism after protesters opposed to Israeli military action in the Gaza Strip openly called for the destruction of Israel and death to Jews.

The protesters, numbering in the tens-to-the-hundreds of thousands, include a hodgepodge of anarchists, hard-left anti-Israel activists and immigrants from the Middle East and North Africa. Many demonstrators — carrying flags of Muslim countries, including Algeria, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Tunisia, Turkey and Syria, as well as the green flag of the Islamist terrorist group Hamas and the black flag of global Jihad — have shouted Islamist chants such as ‘Allahu Akhbar’ (‘Allah is the Greatest’), and have openly called for Jews to be murdered or raped.

MY SAY: MAY 1948 A MONTH TO REMEMBER

Only three years after the end of the Holocaust when the world was still reeling with horror  at the murder of one of every three Jews in the world, despair led to hope when President Harry Truman formally recognized the state of Israel.

On May 12th, President Truman heard his top advisers in the White House advisers at the White House. Clark Clifford made the case for recognition. Secretary of State George Marshall led the opposition, saying he couldn’t vote for President Truman if he pursued recognition. President Truman weighed personal, political and strategic concerns. On May 14th he acted. America recognized the new state of Israel.

This was an ultimate answer to the prayers of millions who died with the words “Hear oh Israel.”

Israel heard and the world heard and the Arabs heard and attacked the newborn state with blood curdling threats of annihilation.

Some things never change…..rsk

MORE HEADLINES MAY 20, 2021

AIPAC urges Congress, White House to ‘unequivocally’ stand by Israel https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/aipac-urges-congress-white-house-to-unequivocally-stand-by-israel/
Democrats Really Hate Jews https://townhall.com/columnists/derekhunter/2021/05/18/democrats-really-hate-jews-n2589582
Is Biden Another Neville Chamberlain? https://townhall.com/columnists/olivernorth/2021/05/18/is-biden-another-neville-chamberlain-n2589601?
Meet the Team of Israel-Haters Joe Biden Has Assembled https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/robert-spencer/2021/05/17/meet-the-team-of-israel-haters-joe-biden-has-assembled-n1447402
AP torched for claiming they were unaware of Hamas intel operation in their building: ‘Difficult to believe’ https://www.foxnews.com/media/ap-torched-for-claiming-they-were-unaware-of-hamas-intel-operation-building-difficult-believe
Pompeo says evidence suggests coronavirus originated from Wuhan lab, risk of bioterror ‘very real’ https://www.foxnews.com/politics/pompeo-coronavirus-wuhan-china

Why Does the Left Hate Israel? Hating Israel has become the surrogate Western way of hating itself. By Victor Davis Hanson

https://amgreatness.com/2021/05/19/why-does-the-left-hate-israel/

As over 3,000 rockets are fired into Israel by Hamas, the establishment of the Democratic Party seems paralyzed over how to respond to the latest Middle East war. 

It is not just that they fear that the squad, Black Lives Matter, the shock troops of Antifa, and the woke institutions such as professional sports, academia, and the media are now unapologetically anti-Israel. 

They are in terror also that anti-Israelism is becoming synonymous with rank anti-Semitism. And soon the Democratic Party will end up disdained as much as was the British Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn. 

The new core of the Democrats, as emblemized by Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), has in the past questioned the patriotism of American Jews who support Israel, and often has had to apologize for puerile anti-Semitic rants. 

The Left in general believes we should judge harshly even the distant past without exemptions. Why then, in venomous, knee-jerk fashion, does it fixate on a nation born from the Holocaust, while favoring Israel’s enemies, who were on the side of the Nazis in World War II? 

It was not just that the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Amin al-Husseini, was a Nazi sympathizer. Egypt, for example, welcomed ex-Nazis for their hatred of Jews and their military expertise—whether the infamous death camp doctor Aribert Ferdinand Heim or Waffen-SS henchman Otto Skorzeny. The Hamas charter still reads like it is cribbed from Hitler’s Mein Kampf. 

The Left claims it champions consensual government and believes the United States must use its soft power clout to isolate autocracies. But the Palestinian Authority and Hamas refuse to hold free and regularly scheduled elections. If an Israeli strong man ever suspended free elections and ruled through brutality, U.S. aid would be severed within days. 

If history and democratic values cannot explain fully the hatred of Israel on the Left, perhaps human rights violations do. But here too there is another radical asymmetry. Arab Israeli citizens enjoy far greater constitutional protections than do Arabs living under either the Palestinian Authority or Hamas. 

Is the Left bothered by the allies of Hamas? After all, most are autocracies such as Iran, North Korea, China, and Russia. 

We return then to other reasons for the woke furor directed toward Israel. 

Biden Praises Rashida Tlaib As She Pushes Antisemitic BDS Movement During Conflict By Tristan Justice

President Joe Biden praised Michigan Democrat Rep. Rashida Tlaib during his latest trip to the Midwestern state this week, as the member of “the squad” demands divestment from Israel during conflict with Hamas.
https://thefederalist.com/2021/05/19/biden-praises-rashida-tlaib-as-she-pushes-antisemitic-bds-movement-during-conflict/

“I want to say to you that I admire your intellect, I admire your passion, and I admire your concern for so many other people,” Biden said at a Ford plant in Dearborn. “You’re a fighter, and God thank you for being a fighter.”

On the same trip, Tlaib confronted Biden on the airport tarmac in Detroit and reportedly demanded the president condemn Israel and support the Palestinians. Biden’s approach as Israel faces its worst attacks in years from the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas has remained largely muted, with the president only saying he hopes the conflict comes to a quick end while professing the Jewish state’s right to self-defense.

On Wednesday, Biden told Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the White House expected “a significant de-escalation today” to reach a ceasefire.

Turkish Anti-Semites Celebrate Rockets against Israel by Uzay Bulut

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17383/turkey-antisemites-israel

According to Hamas’s charter and statements by its leaders, its aim is the destruction of Israel, genocide of the Jewish people, and replacing the state with an Islamist one. This, a religious war, is the real reason Hamas and its enablers are conducting an unprovoked, jihadist assault against Israel. The tweets posted by Turks calling for further attacks against Jews just reaffirm the repeated vow of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to “reconquer” Jerusalem, part of the Ottoman Empire, as part of a new caliphate for Islam.

Israeli civilians have indiscriminately been targeted by the rockets of Islamist terrorist groups in Gaza for more than a week now. Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad have fired more than 3,000 of them at Israel since the outbreak of the war on May 10, according to the Israel Defense Forces. Ten people in Israel, including a young child, have been killed in the rocket fire, and hundreds have been injured.

As Tel Aviv was bombed by terrorists based in Gaza on May 11, the Turkish users filled Twitter with Jew-hating posts, calling for more bombardments and murders of more Jews. Some Twitter users, celebrating the attacks and praying for more, shared photos of fires and explosions caused by rockets not intercepted by Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system.

The Turkish news website Avlaremoz reported these posts. Some include:

“Hell all broke loose for you. Fear the Muslim. You’ll burn in hell. May your fire be abundant. Murderers, terrorists. May Allah’s curse be upon you. Jewish flocks. Despicable, cursed Israel. #TelAviv”

“If only I was in Jerusalem now and fighting against Israeli terrorism. If only I could kill Jews in Tel Aviv now and be al-Qassam [the Syrian Muslim preacher Izz ad-Din al-Qassam who launched attacks against British and Jewish targets in the 1930s]. Allah, you know about this much better than I do.”

“The best Jew is a dead Jew.”

“Ya Allah bismillah, inshallah, there won’t be a single alive Jew left until morning.”

“Cowardly Jews are hiding in shelters in Tel Aviv. The Jew only fears power and death.”

“Jerusalem belongs to Islam. Jerusalem is ours.”

“Jewish dogs are looking for a corner to hide from the rockets launched from our Gaza. Inshallah, you will be crushed under those rockets.”

“Beautiful news from Palestinian friends. 9 Jews are dead and more than 30 injured as a result of rockets launched at Tel Aviv.”

“If only you could send 100 TB2 [Turkish unmanned combat aerial vehicles]…. There would no longer be a Tel Aviv or a single Jew left.”

An election audit in New Hampshire may be the pebble that diverts the stream By Andrea Widburg

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2021/05/an_election_audit_in_new_hampshire_may_be_the_pebble_that_diverts_the_stream.html

I’ve shied away from reporting on events in Maricopa because it would require more hours than I have in a day to track intelligently the back-and-forth in that recount. My touchstone there is the fact that the Democrats’ and NeverTrumpers’ ferocious efforts to stop the count strike me as the actions of people with something to hide. Otherwise, they’d be there helping to prove that they’re right. Events in a small town in New Hampshire, though, are more interesting because a low-key audit may reveal serious election anomalies harming Republicans.

Windham, New Hampshire, a town of 14,853 people, has long been a stalwart Republican stronghold in an otherwise Democrat state. As was the case throughout New Hampshire, it relied on AccuVote machines to collect and tally its 2020 votes.

When the election in Windham ended, Kristi St. Laurent, the Democrat candidate, had lost by only 24 votes. With that close a margin, she naturally demanded a hand recount.

The hand recount revealed something very peculiar: St. Laurent hadn’t lost by 24 votes; she’d lost by 420 votes. In a small election, that meant that her margin of defeat wasn’t 0.005% but was, instead, 9.6%, which is a significant loss.

Smart People Say Dumb Things: Bill Gates Edition By Norman Rogers

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2021/05/smart_people_say_dumb_things_bill_gates_edition.html

Bill Gates has written a book: How to Avoid a Climate Disaster. Unfortunately, the book is a disaster. He doesn’t get past the introduction before making mistakes that negate the rest of the book. He claims Carbon Dioxide emissions must be reduced to zero to avoid a climate disaster. Assuming that CO2 can even cause a climate disaster, about half the CO2 emitted every year is reabsorbed by the Earth – by the oceans and by plants. Thus, you don’t need zero, a fifty percent reduction would stop the rise of CO2 in the atmosphere. It is vastly more difficult to cut out all emissions compared to cutting them in half.

Gates claims we have to deploy solar and wind faster and smarter. I wrote a book about wind and solar with the title: Dumb Energy. There is no smart deployment of wind and solar. They are very dumb and very, very expensive. It is routine for solar to cost five times more than electricity from natural gas. Heavy solar deployment makes it even more expensive due to the use of auxiliary batteries.

Gates says we need to create and roll out breakthrough technologies. That’s called the pie in the sky.

Bill Gates strikes me as a good guy, especially compared to the nasty guys running Apple, Facebook and Twitter. He is sincerely trying to help the poor people of the world through his foundation. He is simply out of his depth on climate and is probably talking only to the promoters of climate disaster. There are plenty of scientists that are climate skeptics.

You might think that having a lot of money frees one from the chains imposed by the need to please one’s employer, friends, family and social group. But, rarely do rich people take unpopular positions. Trump is one of the few. Rich people are as much slaves to political fashion as anyone else.

The same applies to scientists. It is unusual for a scientist to question popular wisdom among his peers. As for global warming, an employed scientist risks being fired if he expresses skepticism. Global warming fear is the source of vast funding for science. The hope is that giving money to the people that perpetrated the fraud can save us from it. Most of the scientists publicly skeptical of global warming are retired or otherwise independent of large institutions that hate dissent.