RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2019/01/the-lefts-embrace-of-antisemitism/

Until she spoke out against the plague of Jew hatred that has infected the British Labor Party of Jeremy Corbyn, Channel 4 game show hostess Rachel Riley was known chiefly for high heels and short skirts. Now, as detailed in a recent address, she is a designated target of the Left.

If you told me this time last year that, come January 2019, I’d be standing in Parliament, addressing a room full of people at a Holocaust memorial event, describing the hideous abuse I’ve been receiving daily since I started speaking about the growing problem of antisemitism in the UK, I wouldn’t know where to begin with my incredulity.

My own identity as a Jew has been a confusing one. As I often joke, my mum’s Jewish and my dad’s Man United, and we’ve worshipped far more often at the Theatre of Dreams than I’ve ever been to shul. As a child, I knew not to sing the Jesus bit in the assembly hymns but the bacon sandwiches mum would feed us meant I didn’t quite know where we fit into all of this.

But one part of my Jewish identity, that forms part of my very being, is the deep and irreparable sorrow I feel in relation to the Holocaust.

I’ve always known that having just one Jewish grandparent, in the lifetime of my own Jewish grandparents, was enough for some to feel justified in carrying out unspeakable acts of inhumanity against them, like ripping babies out of mothers’ arms and smashing them against walls.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/13631/palestinians-jihad-against-peace

According to US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, an upcoming US-sponsored global summit to discuss the Middle East and Iran will “bring together dozens of countries from all around the world, from Asia, from Africa, from Western Hemisphere countries, Europe too, the Middle East of course.”

The Palestinian strategy is now based on inciting Arabs against their leaders. This is the message that Abbas and his officials are sending to the Arabs: “You need to join us in our campaign to stop our leaders from making peace with Israel. You must condemn any leader who seeks normalization with Israel as a traitor.”

Other senior Palestinian officials have gone further by warning the Arab countries that any form of normalization with Israel would be considered an act of treason

It now remains to be seen whether the Arab countries will surrender to the latest campaign of Palestinian incitement and intimidation.

Palestinian leaders have recently stepped up their efforts to stop Arab countries from normalizing their relations — or even signing peace agreements — with Israel.

The campaign comes against a backdrop of reports about the warming of relations between Israel and some Arab countries, including a recent visit to Oman by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The specter of peace between the Arab countries and Israel has become a nightmare for Palestinian leaders. Instead of worrying about building a better future — which the Palestinians desperately need — Palestinian leaders are feverishly working to thwart any attempt to bring the Arab countries closer to Israel.

As part of the “anti-normalization” campaign, the Palestinian leaders in the West Bank are now putting pressure on the Arab countries to boycott a US-sponsored global summit to discuss the Middle East and Iran, which is scheduled for next month in Poland.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a televised interview that the meeting would “focus on Middle East stability and peace and freedom and security here in this region, and that includes an important element of making sure that Iran is not a destabilizing influence.”

The meeting, Pompeo said, will “bring together dozens of countries from all around the world, from Asia, from Africa, from Western Hemisphere countries, Europe too, the Middle East of course.”

Palestinian leaders are apparently convinced that the upcoming conference is part of a US effort to normalize relations between the Arab countries and Israel. Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas and his senior officials and spokesmen in Ramallah consider anything the US Administration does or says as a “conspiracy designed to liquidate the Palestinian cause and national rights.”

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/13607/turkey-imprisoning-dissidents

Erdogan did not hide the fact that his statements promising “freedom of faith, freedom of thought and freedom of opinion” were part of his “preparations for the 2019 local elections.” The Turkish president did, however, hide the fact that his words were completely false.

On December 19, Prof. Şebnem Korur Fincancı, president of the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey (TIHV), was sentenced to two and a half years in prison for being one of 2,212 signatories to an “Academics for Peace” petition in 2016. The petition called on the Turkish government to cease its violence against the Kurds in southeastern Turkey. Fincancı is one of 429 academics who, as of December 19, have stood on trial since December 5.

Erdoğan was not telling the truth when he declared that everyone in Turkey would enjoy “freedom of faith, freedom of thought and freedom of opinion.” In fact, Turkish jails and prisons are so packed with people imprisoned for expressing their beliefs, that the government just announced it will be building 228 more prisons over the next five years to accommodate the overflow.

Simultaneously, Turkey is stepping up its decades-long bid to become a member of the European Union. As part of this bid, Turkish Justice Minister Abdulhamit Gul announced on December 11 that he would be unveiling a new strategy for judicial reform. Under no circumstances should the EU allow itself to be duped by such a transparently deceptive and deceitful move.

At a rally in Ankara over the summer, held by the women’s branch of Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan announced:

“From now on, there will be no fight for freedom of faith, freedom of thought and freedom of opinion. Everyone will be free in their own faith [and] be free to live accordingly. [Everyone will be at liberty to] say whatever he [or she] believes in.”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/venezuelan-spring-11548624135

The latest Venezuelan effort to topple dictator Nicolás Maduro is a pivotal moment in Latin American history, as the international community is acknowledging.

Democratically elected National Assembly President Juan Guaidó took an oath to become Venezuela’s interim president on Wednesday, as prescribed by the country’s constitution. Within hours he was recognized by the U.S. and some 20 other democracies, 11 in Latin America. Other governments warned Mr. Maduro that he has to leave.

More than words are at work. Last week the Bank of England blocked Mr. Maduro from withdrawing $1.2 billion in gold reserves. On Friday the U.S. gave Mr. Guaidó control of Venezuelan government accounts at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and other U.S.-insured banks.

Not since the fall of the Soviet empire has a nation risen with such fury and determination to throw off the yoke of socialism. And not since then has Marxist misery been so clear for all the world to see. Venezuelans are experiencing what millions of Russians, Chinese, Cubans and countless others have suffered. Destitute and angry, they want it to end.

How ironic that some American politicians, like Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and newly elected New York Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez want socialism for the U.S. The tide of history is going the other way.

The U.S. has promised the Guaidó government $20 million in humanitarian assistance. It is certainly needed. Venezuela’s socialist revolution, created by the late Hugo Chávez, has produced rising infant-mortality, malnutrition and even starvation. Running water, electricity and toilet paper are now luxuries. Venezuela suffers from hyperinflation, disease and rampant crime and corruption. Millions of hungry, jobless Venezuelans have fled to neighboring countries, the U.S. or Europe.

Venezuelans have made numerous attempts since 2002 to restore the liberties lost when Chávez used his majority backing to dissolve civil rights and a free press. But they were never able to persuade the military high command, infiltrated by Cuba, to break ranks with the dictator. If this time is different it’s because Mr. Maduro can no longer guarantee the interests of the top brass.

Mr. Guaidó is rumored to be backed by Venezuela’s military rank-and-file and midlevel officers. There are also reports that some commanders of detachments around the country no longer support Mr. Maduro.

The regime is unleashing repression and the international community wants to avoid more bloodshed. The U.S. has offered the military high command safe passage out of the country, and if international efforts to cut financial channels for the leadership are successful, many may find it an attractive option.

Over the weekend the European Union said it would recognize Mr. Guaidó as interim president if Mr. Maduro doesn’t agree to fair elections by Feb. 3. That seems dangerous and overly generous: This problem didn’t spring up last week.

Mr. Maduro claims he was elected in May for a second six-year term. The EU, the Lima Group—14 Western Hemisphere countries not including the U.S.—the Organization of American States and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights all objected to that rigged election. The EU, the Lima Group and the Group of Seven refused to recognize the results.

Nevertheless, Mr. Maduro scheduled a swearing-in ceremony for Jan. 10. On Jan. 4 the Lima Group declared Mr. Maduro’s second term illegitimate and warned him not to proceed. He did anyway. On Jan. 10 Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freelandwarned Mr. Maduro that he would not be recognized: “We call on him to immediately cede power to the democratically-elected National Assembly until new elections are held, which must include the participation of all political actors and follow the release of all political prisoners in Venezuela.” CONTINUE AT SITE

https://pjmedia.com/trending/highbrows-vs-deplorables/

“The idea of Europe is in peril.” Thus begins an 800-word open letter published on Friday in the French newspaper Libération and other several European dailies. Written by Bernard-Henri Lévy, the French philosopher, it was signed by thirty “top intellectuals” (as the Guardian put it) from twenty-one countries.

Now, anyone familiar with current affairs will readily agree that Europe – at least Western Europe – is imperiled. It’s imperiled by a European Union whose unelected leaders are determined to convert it into a sovereign superstate with its own army and with ever-expanding powers. And it’s imperiled by hordes of Muslim migrants who, having been forced upon it by those EU leaders, will, barring dramatic reversals, eventually turn the countries of Western Europe into sharia states.

But this isn’t what these “top intellectuals” mean. Note the wording of their letter: they’re not concerned with the well-being of the peoples of Europe; their preoccupation is with the idea of Europe, which is to say with the preservation and fortification of the European Union.

And their message is that the EU is imperiled by – who else? – Europeans themselves.

Who are these “top intellectuals”? The signatories include the renowned novelists Salman Rushdie, Ian McEwan, and Milan Kundera, plus an assortment of philosophers, historians, activists, and social critics, some more famous than others. Their tender concern for the EU’s health is not surprising. The EU was always a project of privileged highbrows, who helped it advance from strength to strength by lying to the governed, acting without their consent, and overruling their votes. Now, with Eastern European governments rejecting dictates from Brussels and with Western European electorates, at long last, demanding that their voices be heard and their wishes respected, the EU’s architects and partisans are balking at the audacity with which the deplorables – the peons, the peasants, the proles – are standing up to them. Lévy writes:

“Enough of ‘building Europe’!” is the cry. Let’s reconnect instead with our “national soul”! Let’s rediscover our “lost identity”! This is the agenda shared by the populist forces washing over the continent. Never mind that abstractions such as “soul” and “identity” often exist only in the imagination of demagogues.

Pace Lévy, a feeling of national identity has long been a potent force in the souls of men. For him and other devotees of the “idea” of an EU superstate, it has been Job One to try to eradicate that patriotism and replace it with a newly forged sense of “European identity.” Unfortunately, these EU boosters have discovered that that particular abstraction thrives only in their own demagogic imaginations, and that most of the people of Europe want nothing to do with it. CONTINUE AT SITE