http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=955 Three slaps and you’re out? It has been a unique week in U.S.-Israeli relations. After first trying to kill a bipartisan Senate sanctions bill directed against Iran’s Central Bank, U.S. Administration officials decided to “work” with the two Senate leaders on the legislation – Bob Menendez and Mark Kirk – to “improve” the bill. […]
http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/ Leon Panetta, fresh from a stint as CIA director and off to his new job as Secretary of Defense, did his best to butch up in the usual way of DC hacks “daringly” delivering the same utterances that have been current in the capital for generations. When Panetta, the man who looks like everyone’s […]
First Panetta, now Ambassador Gutman: When it Comes to US Policy towards Israel, Listen to what its Representatives Say, Not to the President’s Promises Posted By Ron Radosh URL to article: http://pjmedia.com/ronradosh/2011/12/04/first-panetta-now-ambassador-gutman/ First it was Leon Panetta, and now it’s Howard Gutman. President Barack Obama, who just last week told Jewish groups that he […]
Obama’s Middle East Policy: A Unified Field Theory Posted By Barry Rubin
URL to article: http://pjmedia.com/barryrubin/2011/12/05/obamas-middle-east-policy-a-unified-field-theory/
Summary: Muslims good; Islamists moderate; No peace? Israel’s fault; ears closed. Have a nice day!
In the history of physics, the “unified field theory” was an attempt to bring together an understanding of all forms of energy in a single explanation. Albert Einstein tried and failed to discover this. I don’t know much about physics but I know about Middle East policy.
So here’s an effort to bring together all of Obama’s regional policy into a single analysis and explaining everything in 1100 words.
The first point is that the Obama Administration’s behavior must be divided into two phases. They overlap and feature the same kind of thinking but they are also quite separate.
Phase One, from January 2009 until December 2011 was characterized by an emphasis on Israel-Palestinian peacemaking. Obama’s Administration believed that it was possible to make rapid progress toward peace and also thought that this was essential to achieve anything else in the Middle East.
URL to article: http://pjmedia.com/blog/gunwalker-justice-dept-violated-us-laws/
As we continue to watch the general uproar over the Operation Fast and Furious program, and specifically what Attorney General Holder knew and when he knew it, it needs to be noted that perjury is not the only apparent violation of law to have occurred.
I refer to the apparent violation of at least one (probably two) major U.S. laws by the Holder Justice Department. A few years ago, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701, the follow-on to the Trading with the Enemy Act) was expanded in order to criminalize any transactions between U.S. entities — to include departments and agencies of the U.S. government — and all foreign drug cartels.
I am familiar with these prohibitive statues because several years ago, while serving as the senior drug analyst for the Senate Intelligence Committee, I was tasked to initiate and became the principal drafter of legislation which became known as the Kingpin Act (21 U.S.C. §§ 1901-08). The Kingpin Act is an extension of the highly successful IEEPA sanctioning program specifically targeting Colombian drug cartels. It expands sanctions authority against various drug cartel operations worldwide — including Mexico — which have been determined by the president to be threats to the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the United States.
A violation of any of the IEEPA sanctioning programs or the Kingpin Act carries stiff penalties, both criminal and civil, and potentially totaling decades in prison and tens of millions of dollars in fines. It is not necessary that an individual or governmental entity be shown to have “knowingly” violated any of these programs: it is illegal for any U.S. entity or individual to aid, abet, or materially assist — or in the case of Operation Fast and Furious, to facilitate others to aid, abet, or materially assist — designated drug traffickers. There are no exceptions within IEEPA programs for unlicensed U.S. law enforcement or intelligence agency operations.
Based on the July 5, 2010, memo to Eric Holder, it would appear that Fast and Furious facilitated the delivery of weapons to — at a minimum — the Sinaloa cartel in Mexico. The U.S. Department of the Treasury, which administers both the IEEPA and Kingpin Act programs, has designated numerous members of the Sinaloa cartel under both programs. IEEPA prohibitions apply to the U.S. government as well as to individuals, and as stated there are no exceptions within IEEPA programs for unlicensed U.S. law enforcement or intelligence agency operations.
There is a provision in the Kingpin Act for “authorized” law enforcement and intelligence activities, however the only procedure by which an Operation Fast and Furious program could have been “authorized” under the Kingpin Act was by the U.S. attorney general requesting a waiver (known within the Treasury Department as a Specific License), prior to any such operation being undertaken. To illustrate and emphasize this point: even during the run-up to war in Iraq, the U.S. secretary of Defense had to obtain waivers (specific licenses) from the Treasury Department to allow U.S. Special Forces and their necessary equipment (to include weapons, intelligence gathering, and targeting gear) to go into Iraq, as Iraq at the time was under separate IEEPA sanctions.
http://www.hudson-ny.org/2639/muslim-brotherhood-ideology-in-egypt
PMW translation of “Jihad Is the Way” by former leader of Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt
Central messages:
1. Muslims are “masters of the world”
2. Islamic nation’s “rightful position… the teachers of humanity”
3. “There is no other option but Jihad for Allah
4. Fighting Israel is “Jihad against the criminal, thieving gangs of Zion”
5. Has the [Muslim] Brotherhood grown weary of the challenges, thrown down their guns and abandoned Jihad?!! No!”
The Muslim Brotherhood took first place in Egypt’s first round of elections last week with 40% of the vote and the Salafist Islamists received 20%. In order to understand the implications, Palestinian Media Watch is redistributing our translation of the book Jihad Is the Way, written by Mustafa Mashhur, who was the official leader of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt 1996-2002. The book is the fifth volume of his work called The Laws of Da’wa (Islamic missionary activity).
In the book Jihad Is the Way the fundamental concepts of the Muslim Brotherhood ideology are explained, including, the Muslim Brotherhood’s goal of establishing an Islamic state, world domination under Islam, the public and personal religious duty of military Jihad, and the necessity of timing the ultimate Jihad properly. The book warns Muslims not to rush to Jihad until Jihad is prepared and timed fully for maximum benefit. The current period is seen by the Muslim Brotherhood as one of obligatory preparation for that coming Jihad. Click to view full translation in PDF
PMW has selected the following quotes from Jihad is the way to illustrate central ideas of Muslim Brotherhood ideology. PMW’s translation of the book follows below.
Muslim Brotherhood goal: Islamic world domination
http://www.hudson-ny.org/2640/britain-muslim-honor-crimes
More than 2,800 so-called honor attacks — punishments for bringing shame on the family — were recorded by British police last year, according to the first-ever national estimate of the problem.
The highest number of honor crimes — which include murder, mutilation, beatings, abductions and acid attacks — was recorded in London, where the problem has doubled to more than five times the national average.
Still, although the statistics provide the best national estimate so far, they do not give the full picture of the levels of honor violence in Britain. The real figure could be five times as high and in any case shows that Muslim parallel societies are now firmly established in Britain, thanks to decades-long multicultural immigration policies in the country.
The data on honor violence in Britain was released on December 3 by the London-based Iranian and Kurdish Women’s Rights Organization (IKWRO), a registered charity that provides advice to Muslim women and girls living in the United Kingdom, who are facing forced marriage, honor-based violence, female genital mutilation and domestic abuse.
http://www.thejc.com/comment-and-debate/columnists/59354/the-future-hebrons-jewish-past
The future of Hebron’s Jewish past
By Melanie Phillips, December 1, 2011
Until recently, I had never been to Hebron. In the past three months, however, I have twice boarded an armoured bus to make the journey. The first time was with a private, non-political group to visit Hebron’s Jewish area and the Cave of Machpelah, where Abraham and the patriarchs and matriarchs are said to be buried.
It was a shock. If ever there was a illustration of the attempt by Islam to supersede Judaism, this was surely it. This holy Jewish shrine was to all intents a mosque. Islamic prayer mats were piled high, and there seemed to be not one Jewish artefact in the place. Even the catafalques sporting labels claiming them as the tombs of the founders of Judaism were topped by Islamic crescents.
Those labels are hung only on the handful of days per year the Jews are allowed to visit. Hebron has become a synonym in the west for oppression of the Palestinians by “crazed settlers” but it is in fact those Jewish residents who are hanging on by their fingernails to a minimal right of access to one of Judaism’s holiest sites. Their presence requires the IDF to ensure that access. Without the soldiers, does anyone seriously imagine Machpelah would not suffer the same fate as Joseph’s Tomb in Nablus which, after the Israelis were forced to abandon it, was burned to the ground?
http://www.thejewishadvocate.com/sites/www.thejewishadvocate.com/files/images/2011-12-02/16p1.jpg
It might have been just some local government scandal: A shuttered public school sold in a no-bid contract to a private buyer after officials told other interested buyers the building was not up for sale; residents up in arms and suing. … Nasty, but it could happen almost anywhere.
It turns out, however, that the new owner plans to turn the school into a mosque. And that among the buyers who were turned away was a religious Jewish school. And that the mosquebuilding group is affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood. And that the Anti- Defamation League – the nation’s largest Jewish defense organization – did nothing for the Jewish school, but is defending the mosque deal. This is not just some local corruption story.
http://www.andrewbostom.org/blog/2011/12/04/qaradawi-the-%E2%80%9Carab-spring%E2%80%9D-and-the-treason-of-the-intellectuals/Qaradawi, the “Arab Spring” and The Treason of the Intellectuals
Friday February 18, 2011 marked the triumphal return to Cairo of Muslim Brotherhood “Spiritual Guide” Yusuf al-Qaradawi. After years of exile, his public re-emergence in Egypt was sanctioned by the nation’s provisional military rulers. 1 Qaradawi’s own words were accompanied by images and actions during his appearance which should have shattered the delusive view that the turmoil leading to President Mubarak’s resignation augured the emergence of a modern, democratic Egyptian society devoted to Western conceptions of individual liberty, and equality before the law.
Egyptian cleric Safwat Higazi could be seen prominently behind al-Qaradawi for the duration of the latter’s speech. Recently Higazi, during his Arabic-language program “Age of Glory,” broadcast on the Egyptian al-Nas satellite television network, issued an unabashed call for aggressive violent, jihad. He quoted a hadith from ‘Ali, the son-in-law of the Muslim prophet Muhammad and Islam’s fourth “Rightly Guided” caliph, in which ‘Ali tells his sons: “Go, fight, and please your grandfather [i.e. Muhammad]. Let him be pleased with you. Fighting is what pleases the prophet (peace be upon him).” Higazi also urged jihadists, graphically, when attacking non-Muslim infidels to “Strike and split the head, and cut it in half.” 2 Equally plain are Higazi’s goals for this brutal jihadism—the re-creation of a transnational Muslim Caliphate: 3
I am convinced that Islam is imminent, the caliphate is imminent. One of these days, the United States of Islam will be established. Allah willing, it will be soon. Egypt will be one state in this [United States of Islam.] Morocco and Saudi Arabia will be states as well.
