A Turkish bill that would clear men of statutory rape provided they marry the victim is on the receiving end of criticism from opposition groups that are accusing the government of legitimizing child sexual assault.
The bill received preliminary backing in the parliament Thursday and is due for a second round of voting after a debate next week. Proposed by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), the bill would clear those convicted of assault only if they had sex without “force, threat, or any other restriction on consent” and if they marry the victim.
Violence against women is on the rise in Turkey with nearly 40 percent of cases of sexual and physical abuse reported. Murder of women has also increased by 1,400 percent from 2003 to 2010. The legal age of consent in the country is 18 years but child marriage is widespread.
According to the BBC, the government has said the aim of the bill “is not to excuse rape but to rehabilitate those who may not have realized their sexual relations were unlawful – or to prevent girls who have sex under the age of 18 from feeling ostracized by their community.”
Critics, which include the opposition, celebrities, an association whose deputy chairman is Erdoğan’s daughter, are worried that the bill – which if passed is likely to quash nearly 3,000 convictions – would also legitimize child marriage in addition to overlooking child sexual assault.
“The AKP is pushing through a text which pardons those who marry the child that they raped,” Ozgur Ozel, a lawmaker belonging to the opposition Republican People’s Party reportedly said.
Last week the Shia terrorist organization and Iranian proxy, Hezbollah, held a military parade in the city of Al-Qusayr, located in western Syria. The venue was likely chosen for its symbolism. In 2013, it was the site of fierce battles between the Free Syrian Army and Hezbollah. Though it suffered heavy casualties, the Shia terror group eventually gained the upper hand over the rebels and succeeded in ejecting them from the city and surrounding region.
The parade featured a wide assortment of Russian weapons including laser guided AT-14 Kornet anti-tank missiles, T-72 tanks equipped with reactive armor and R-330P electronic warfare vehicles. But among the weapons displayed, one stood out as a curiosity – the American made M-113 armored personnel carrier. The Hezbollah configuration mounts a twin 23mm anti-aircraft cannon that could also be used in an infantry support role.
The M-113 is essentially a battle taxi whose primary purpose is to ferry troop into battle while offering a measure of armored protection. It was introduced into the U.S. military during the early 1960s and is a versatile platform that has since been configured to take on a variety of roles including mortar and anti-tank missile carrier. One highly effective variant, known as the M163 Vulcan Air Defense System, mounts a six-barreled 20mm cannon.
Since its introduction, the M-113 has seen extensive service with the U.S. military and militaries throughout the world. The vehicle has been widely exported and is known to be in service with the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF). Lebanon is the fifth largest recipient of U.S. military assistance and U.S. military aid to Lebanon in 2016 totaled $216 million. The Pentagon and the State Department maintain oversight over all shipments to the LAF to ensure that the weapons are utilized for the purposes intended.
Hezbollah is lavishly supplied by Iran but there has been growing speculation that Hezbollah has been pilfering weapons from LAF stocks. The revelation of M-113s in Hezbollah’s arsenal has lent credence to this notion. It is also possible that Hezbollah captured the weapons from the now defunct South Lebanon Army (SLA). During the 1980s Israel transferred a small number of M-113s to the SLA. When Israel withdrew from Lebanon in 2000, the SLA collapsed and its weapons, including M-113s, fell into the hands of Hezbollah.
The LAF has denied claims that it either supplied Hezbollah with U.S. equipment or turned a blind eye toward misappropriation but irrespective of how Hezbollah acquired the M-113s, it is clear that the aid given to the LAF by the United States is not being utilized for its intended purpose. As noted by the Weekly Standard’s Lee Smith;
“The 2016 appropriations bill to Lebanon stipulated that military aid must be used ‘to professionalize the LAF and to strengthen border security and combat terrorism, including training and equipping the LAF to secure Lebanon’s borders, interdicting arms shipments, preventing the use of Lebanon as a safe haven for terrorist groups.’ The military assistance was also intended to help Lebanon ‘implement United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701’—namely, disarming Hezbollah and helping the government of Lebanon take full control of all its territory.”
The lunacy of the immigration executive orders and other actions of the Obama administration to block the enforcement of our immigration laws and immigration anarchy will be brought to a screeching halt on the day that Donald Trump replaces Mr. Obama in the Oval Office.
However the “Immigration All-Clear” will not be sounded across the United States in cities and states that have been declared “Sanctuaries” by the mayors and governors who have created a false and very dangerous narrative that equates immigration law enforcement with racism and bigotry.
This insidious false claim has been heartily embraced by the demonstrators who are rampaging across the United States to protest the election of Donald Trump and his promises to secure the U.S./Mexican border and enforce our immigration laws.
This is the false narrative that has enabled mayors of so-called “Sanctuary Cities” to foist this lunacy on the residents of their cities and was the focus of my article, “Terrorism, Enclaves and Sanctuary Cities: How sanctuary cities facilitate the growth of terror enclaves in America.”
The challenge for the Trump administration and for all Americans, is to eliminate these enclaves of lawlessness.
Sanctuary cities are highly attractive to illegal aliens and the criminals, fugitives and likely terrorists among them who entered the United States by evading the inspections process conducted at ports of entry by the CBP (Customs and Border Protection) inspectors and are vulnerable to arrest and removal (deportation).
Sanctuary cities, however, certainly do not provide “sanctuary” for the residents of those cities who, all too often, fall victim to the crimes committed by these criminal aliens. However, what is generally not understood is that Sanctuary Cities endanger every person in the United States, no matter where they live.
Terrorists would most likely seek to set up shop in sanctuary cities to evade detection and arrest.
They can use the security provided by such “leaders” as Chicago’s Rahm Emanuel and New York’s Bill de Blasio as a staging area for attacks they might carry out in the cities where they live or in other cities they could easily travel to on the day of an attack.
While politicians from both parties often claim that the “Immigration system is broken” as a way of justifying their positions of advocacy for massive amnesty programs and the creation of these dangerous “sanctuaries” for criminals, fugitives and terrorists, in reality, this is “Immigration Failure — By Design.”
America’s borders and immigration laws are our first line of defense and last line of defense against international terrorists, transnational criminals, fugitives from justice and those foreign nationals who would displace American workers wrecking havoc on the lives of those Americans and their families when they lose their jobs and their paychecks.
A quick review of a section of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA)- Title 8, United States Code, Section 1182 would quickly dispel the bogus claim that equates the enforcement of our immigration laws with racism.
The New War on Conservative Media Censoring conservative voices from social media. Daniel Greenfield
Remember when Hillary Clinton won a landslide victory? The fake news media which predicted it in order to depress pro-Trump voter turnout certainly does. And so they’re out to fight “fake news.”
By fake news, they don’t mean their own raging torrent of misinformation and lies.
The media has gone to war against Facebook. While various supporters have blamed Hillary’s loss on everything from the FBI to internalized misogyny, the media has decided that Facebook is to blame.
Why Facebook?
Cable news is dying. Newspapers struggle online and offline. The mainstream media’s profitability lives and dies by social media. But the essence of social media is that it allows communities to shape what they see. That’s a terrifying idea if you’re a media conglomerate that depends on its megaphone.
But it’s also scary if you’re a leftist running for office in a country that doesn’t agree with your views.
Obama blamed “messaging” for the election results. But messaging requires being able to reach people. And that means clearing competitive voices out of the social media space by banning conservatives.
The war on conservative media is being conducted under the guise of banishing “fake news” from Facebook. But the fake news devil is in the details. Fake news can mean satire sites like the Onion or the Daily Currant. It can mean foreign clickbait sites that invent fake news. But it can also mean sites from outside the mainstream media whose stories are contested by the left for partisan reason.
The war on fake news is a smoke screen for a campaign against conservative media. And it’s easy to see that it’s conservative sites that are the real target of the Facebook book burners.
Buzzfeed, which depends heavily on Facebook traffic , has fed the “fake news” hysteria. Its list of “fake news” sites includes “hyperpartisan” sites. Its story contrasting “legitimate” mainstream media outlets, a category that somehow includes the Huffington Post, with a variety of right-leaning sites is a major piece of supporting evidence used in the fake news crusade.
Considering BuzzFeed’s history of fake news stories that fit its political narrative, it has no credibility fact checking anyone else. Examinations of BuzzFeed’s own methodology for its fake news article tore it into tiny little shreds. Its claim that fake news outperformed real news turned out to be… fake.
But what’s more important is how quickly the goal posts have been moved from fake news to conservative news, from fraudulent sites to fighting “clickbait” or “hyperpartisan” sites. And it’s clear that these are largely a euphemism for sites on the right that are outperforming the media.
The State Department issued a new travel alert for Europe today, warning American citizens about the potential for attacks particularly as the holiday season approaches.
The alert specifically noted that U.S. citizens “should exercise caution at holiday festivals, events, and outdoor markets.”
“Credible information indicates the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL or Da’esh), al-Qa’ida, and their affiliates continue to plan terrorist attacks in Europe, with a focus on the upcoming holiday season and associated events,” the notice continued. “U.S. citizens should also be alert to the possibility that extremist sympathizers or self-radicalized extremists may conduct attacks during this period with little or no warning.”
“Terrorists may employ a wide variety of tactics, using both conventional and non-conventional weapons and targeting both official and private interests.”
ISIS’ Rumiyah magazine has been giving guidelines on different terror tactics in their first three issues, including choosing random victims such as teens playing sports in a park, conducting random knife attacks on gatherings or lone passers-by, and plowing a heavy vehicle into a parade or political rally crowd in the model of the Bastille Day attack in Nice, France.
Last month, soon after the offensive to retake Mosul was launched, U.S. officials warned that ISIS could stage a “spectacular attack” to draw attention away from their losses at the hands of the Iraq-led coalition. In a rare break from their usual propaganda last week, ISIS admitted losing a handful of districts in Mosul to Iraqi forces.
The commander for U.S. operations in Iraq and Syria also warned that “an external plot” for a terror attack was being fomented in Raqqa, ISIS’ capital in Syria.
Pressed on what that external threat could entail, Lt. Gen. Stephen Townsend told reporters last month that he didn’t want to discuss specific intelligence but “we actually aren’t sure how pressing it is, and that’s what’s worrying us.”
“So we’re not sure, we know they’re up to something. And it’s an external plot, we don’t know exactly where, we don’t know exactly when. You can understand this because you’ve been following these kinds of terrorist plots for a number of years, and we’re gonna try to hit if off,” he said.
Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula also recently published a new issue of their English-language Inspire magazine — the premiere DIY guide for lone jihadists — analyzing the Sept. 17 attacks on a race in New Jersey, a street in Manhattan and a shopping mall in Minnesota.
Federal authorities arrested a Brooklyn driver early Monday on charges of attempting to support ISIS just days before the annual Thanksgiving parade in New York that was the subject of a recent threat in an Islamic State magazine.
A criminal complaint alleges that Mohamed Rafik Naji, 37, a legal permanent U.S. resident and citizen of Yemen, discussed a plot to try to conduct a Nice-style attack using a garbage truck to mow down people in Times Square.
Naji was seized at his apartment on Clarendon Road in Flatbush in a multi-agency arrest. Authorities said he worked as a driver for Uber, though the company told NBC4 that he didn’t work for them.
According to the unsealed complaint, Naji began sounding off on Facebook about his support for ISIS beginning in 2014 soon after the group’s declaration of their caliphate. He even made an ISIS image the cover photo on his Facebook page.
From March to September 2015, Naji traveled to Turkey and Yemen “in an effort to join ISIL.” After flying from JFK airport to Istanbul, Naji emailed his girlfriend back in the United States, telling her, “Everything ok so far I met this taxi guy look like a good guy he said he’s gonna take me short cut almost there inshallah I love u hunny so much.”
Naji allegedly followed up in another email to his girlfriend six days later after trying to access ISIS-controlled parts of Yemen, complaining “it’s very hard to get in I’m on my 5 try.” Two days after that, the complaint states, he told his girlfriend that he and his party “almost got killed today by army” and were hiding in the mountains without food or water — “glad u didn’t come.” He emailed his girlfriend a photo of jihadists on their trek, followed by an admission that he was “thinking of coming back m really really tired.”
What would we do without psychological studies about sex and gender? We’ve had studies that most women are “part lesbian” and a lack of access to sports bras deters girls from playing sports. We’ve had a study showing that women are more likely to become lesbian if they don’t have ready access to men and a landmark study showing that female chimpanzees are more likely to be domineering feminists.
And now we have a new study concluding that white, masculine men are more likely to be mentally ill, conducted by Y. Joel Wong, a man who isn’t white, may not be masculine, and actually…who knows if he is really a man for sure?
Men who have “playboy” attitudes and believe in power over women may face a higher risk for mental health trouble than men who don’t, a broad new research review suggests.
The finding on sexism, and other so-called “traditional views” on masculinity, stems from an analysis of 74 studies conducted between 2003 and 2013. The studies included nearly 19,500 predominantly white male participants, the researchers said.
The research “looked at expectations about what it means to be masculine, and how that relates to mental health outcomes among men,” explained study lead author Y. Joel Wong.
“What we found overall is that the more that men conformed to masculine norms the poorer their mental health, and the less likely they were to seek mental health services,” he said.
Wong’s team focused on data concerning the embrace of 11 different types of so-called “masculine norms,” including the desire to win; to retain emotional control; to take risks; to engage in violence; to exert dominant behavior; to participate in a “playboy” lifestyle; to be self-reliant; to elevate work to the highest level of importance; to retain power over women; to maintain a disdain for homosexuals; and to pursue “status.”
Desiring to win = mentally ill. Retaining emotional control = mentally ill. Making work a priority = mentally ill. But I’m glad that at least these are traits associated with “masculinity.” I’m not 100% sure what a “playboy” lifestyle or “retaining power over women” means; by these twisted standards, it may simply mean a refusal to be subservient to women like these emotionally castrated guys.
There have been many excellent post-election analyses since Trump’s improbable win, most of have which have identified the disaffected working class and the failure of the Democrats’ politically correct identity politics as the driving factors.
But one thing that seems to be overlooked is the Tea Party, the reasons for its beginnings, and its underlying anti-establismentarianism in this election.
It was not just the failure of the Democrats’ urban-centric political focus on minorities, women, and income inequality that deep-sixed Hillary Clinton’s campaign. Walking it back, what has outraged so many grassroots conservatives was the phony conservatism under George W. Bush, culminating in the financial crisis of 2008. It pushed them overboard to no longer get fooled by the Republican establishment that had been basically a milder form of the big-government progressivism that had taken over the Democratic Party following the loss of Hubert Humphrey in 1968 to Richard Nixon. It was that crushing loss that sent Democrats on a far-left trajectory for decades to come.
Bush did nothing to cut back the size and growth of government. Instead, he actually expanded it through his unfunded Medicare Part D prescription drug program and the “No Child Left Behind” federally mandated education program. There were no efforts at all to rein in spending and the size of the federal government. And the war with Iraq added untold billions to the ever expanding annual federal deficits.
Bush’s “compassionate conservatism” was liberalism in disguise. From “Decision Time for the GOP Elite” at AT:
Remember that the Republicans controlled both houses of Congress during the presidency of George W. Bush and yet nothing was done to control the size, scope, or cost of the federal government.
In an effort to push gender-neutral bathrooms on campus, students at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, are participating in a “sh–t in” by occupying restrooms in an administrative building.
Involving over 220 students, the “sh–t in” is currently being led by Amherst’s Gender Liberation Union. Throughout the week, students will be occupying bathroom stalls.
In an interview with HuffPo, “sh–t in” organizer Justin Killian, a gender and sexuality major (yes, that’s an actual thing) at Amherst, said the protest is about changing cultural aversions towards gender-bathrooms since Massachusetts law allows people to go into whatever bathroom they choose.
“We have legal protections in Massachusetts that allow people to use any bathroom they feel comfortable with,” Kilian explained. “But having the legal ability doesn’t mean cultural ability.”
“We want a third space that does not have cultural or gender surveillance,” she said.
Killian also said the administrative caved within two days, providing everything on their list of demands.
“The administration agreed to our progressive benchmarks within two days.” Kilian said proudly. “Hormones are now available at Health Services. Before, you had to drive two hours to get them.”
Jordan is the existing Palestinian State…The Arabs in their duplicity know that and any Arab sovereignty in Judea and Samaria will lead to unending war.rsk
If the international community wants to see Israel make dangerous concessions, then they, and they alone, must ensure that Israel has a united and pragmatic peace partner.
This should be Israel’s basic demand: that a united Palestinian political leadership will recognize the right of all the citizens of the Jewish State of Israel to live in peace and security, alongside the State of Palestine.
It is that simple. That is all it takes.
The notion that the creation of a state of Palestine will herald everlasting peace is naïve in the extreme.
After 50 years of a two-state failure, the French and other diplomats, in their duplicitously-named “peace initiative,” have no other idea for how to settle the Palestinian problem, except to behave like parched men trudging across a burning desert toward a distant mirage that they think is an oasis paradise. It is not, and the same diplomats will take no responsibility for cleaning up the dangerous outcome of such a disaster.
The international community is pressuring Israel to make wholesale concessions in territory and security, risking social and political upheaval, to grant the so-called Palestinians a state of their own.
The sole criterion for making this happen is for the international community to accept the Palestinian precondition of forcing Israel withdraw to pre-1967 lines, which are the 1949 armistice lines and not a defined border.
