RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-u-s-iraq-and-iran-11578263875?mod=opinion_lead_pos1

The U.S. strikes in Iraq against Iranian-backed militias and Qasem Soleimani were necessary, but they always risked a nationalist backlash. The Iraqi Parliament’s symbolic vote Sunday to oust U.S. troops from the country is an example of that backlash, but it’s also far from the last word.

The vote was not decisive, as only a little over half of Iraq’s 329 members of parliament were present to vote on the nonbinding resolution. Kataib Hezbollah, the militia allied with Iran’s Quds Force that stormed the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad last week, issued threats against lawmakers who voted against the resolution.

Shiite lawmakers hold a majority and most voted in favor, while Kurdish and most Sunni members didn’t show up. Iraq’s minorities understand better than anyone the risk of Iranian domination, and both have supported a continuing American military presence.

Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi supported the vote, but he’s a caretaker who in November promised to resign after widespread protests sapped the legislature’s legitimacy. Elections for a new parliament are expected this year. The public already has registered its disgust with the Iraqi ruling class, and no doubt the U.S. and Iranian presence in the country will be major election issues.

The parliament also voted to file a complaint with the United Nations about the strike against Soleimani. Those suddenly concerned about international law apparently weren’t worried that Soleimani’s presence in Iraq was illegal under a 2007 United Nations Security Council resolution that was still in force. If the terrorist ringleader had adhered to that U.N. travel restriction, he’d still be alive.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15369/christmas-christians-beheaded

How much bigger and more extended must this war on Christians become before the West considers it a “genocide” and acts to prevent it?

The day after Christians were beheaded in Nigeria, Pope Francis admonished Western society. About beheaded Christians? No. “Put down your phones, talk during meals”, the Pope said. He did not speak a single word about the horrific execution of his Christian brothers and sisters. A few days before that, Pope Francis hung a cross encircled by a life jacket in memory of migrants who lost their lives in the Mediterranean Sea. He did not commemorate the lives of Christians killed by Islamic extremists with even a mention.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said that her priority will be fighting climate change. She did not mention persecuted Christians. Meanwhile The Economist wrote that Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, a passionate defender of persecuted Christians, politically “exploits” the issue.

“The United Nations has held inquiries and focuses its anger on Israel for defending itself against that same terrorist organization [Hamas]. But the barbarous slaughter of thousands upon thousands of Christians is met with relative indifference”. — Ambassador Ronald S. Lauder, President of the World Jewish Congress, The New York Times, August 19, 2014.

Martha Bulus, a Nigerian Catholic woman, was going to her bridal party when she was abducted by Islamic extremists of Boko Haram. Martha and her companions were beheaded and their execution filmed. The video of the brutal murders of these 11 Christians was released on December 26 to coincide with Christmas celebrations. It is reminiscent of the images of other Christians dressed in orange jumpsuits bent on their knees on a beach, each being held by a masked, black-clad jihadist holding a knife at their throats. Their bodies were discovered in a mass grave in Libya.

On the scale of Nigeria’s anti-Christian persecution, Martha was less fortunate than another abducted girl, Leah Sharibu, who has now been in captivity nearly two years and just spent her second Christmas in the hands of Boko Haram. The reason? Leah refused to convert to Islam and deny her Christianity. Nigerian Christian leaders are also protesting the “continuous abduction of under-aged Christian girls by Muslim youths…”. These girls “are forcefully converted to Islam and taken in for marriage without the consent of their parents”.

https://www.city-journal.org/anti-semitism-paris-new-york

Anti-Semitism seems to be as ancient as the Jewish people themselves. Hellenistic texts from 300 BC exude stereotypes regarding Jews’ physical traits and supposed love for money. Anti-Semitism, however, comes in many shades, depending on the local culture, just as being Jewish in the diaspora is a varied experience. Living in Paris and New York, I see this difference explicitly. When I first rented a place in Manhattan, I was flabbergasted by the mezuzahs attached at so many entrances, including of commercial establishments. Despite the recent outbreak of anti-Semitic attacks in New York, Jews are not a tiny minority in the city and have no reason to hide. In Paris, we tend to be more discreet; if we have a mezuzah, we will usually place it inside.

In New York, Jews are divided into distinct communities—Conservative, Modern Orthodox, Reform, ultra-Orthodox—not familiar in France. In Paris, where Jews are scattered around the city, the main distinction is between Ashkenazim—Jews with an Eastern European background—and Jews who came to France in the 1960s from Algeria and other North African colonies, following independence. This second group now constitutes a majority and doesn’t always see eye-to-eye politically and culturally with the Ashkenazim, especially on the question of Israel. French society, however, which promotes active laicization as a positive value much more vigorously than does America, has largely secularized all of us. The French generally do not attend religious services, except for weddings and funerals: on Sunday morning, churches stay mostly empty, and the same goes with most synagogues on Saturday. Paris’s Orthodox Jewish community is rather small and concentrated in specific neighborhoods of Paris and its suburbs.