RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.wsj.com/articles/comedian-elected-president-of-ukraine-exit-poll-shows-11555867039

Ukrainians elected a comedian with no political experience as president Sunday in a damning verdict on their ruling class five years after a violent pro-Western revolution, exit surveys of voters showed.

Volodymyr Zelensky, who plays a school teacher-turned-president in a Ukrainian TV series, trounced incumbent President Petro Poroshenko with about 73% percent of the vote, according to national exit polls shortly after voting ended.

In the first round of voting in March, Mr. Zelensky defeated Mr. Poroshenko and former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, gaining more votes than both of the political heavyweights combined.

Ukraine, Europe’s second poorest nation, has been a major flashpoint in deteriorating relations between the West and Russia since Moscow annexed the Crimean Peninsula and launched a covert military operation in eastern Ukraine in 2014.

https://thefederalist.com/2019/04/22/islamic-terrorism-remains-the-worlds-greatest-threat-to-peace/

After the horrific mass murder of 50 Muslim worshippers in Christchurch, New Zealand, there was widespread coverage and a torrent of mainstream news networks contemplating the threat of white supremacy. These conversations, completely reasonable and necessary in the face of violent attacks from a racist gunman, soon began deteriorating into politically motivated and specious claims contending that “white supremacy” had become the predominate terror threat in the world.

Well, the coordinated bomb blasts aimed at Christian worshippers on Easter Sunday, which killed at least 290 people and injured hundreds more, demonstrates the kind of meticulous planning, funding, resources, and support that is still exclusively the domain of radical Islamic terrorism. It’s not merely that the act was planned to maximize the death toll, but that it is a continuation of long-standing efforts by Islamists to destroy the Christian communities left in Asia.

https://www.steynonline.com/9317/taqiyya-for-easter

Let’s say a fire breaks out at Notre Dame cathedral in Paris at the start of Holy Week, and just after two of the city’s other most prominent houses of worship – St Sulpice and the Basilica of St Denis – have been attacked and vandalized.

Well, I think we can all confidently say as the first flames are beginning to lick the ceiling that it’s undoubtedly an accident. Cigarette butt. Or maybe computer glitch. Probably just an overheated smart phone. We don’t need to get in there and sift through the debris. We can just announce it.

On the other hand, when there are coordinated attacks on Easter services at several churches in Sri Lanka, it becomes a little more challenging to pass off multiple suicide-bombings killing nearly three hundred people as an electrical malfunction.
So, in contrast to the confident declarations of a week ago, on Sunday morning the media opted for a subtler narrative. Lead sentence from The Economist:IT HAS BEEN nearly ten years since the guns fell silent in Sri Lanka’s civil war. But bloodshed returned with a vengeance…So it’s something to do with the Tamil Tigers? Their guns fell silent, but now they’ve returned with a vengeance, eh?Well, er, no, er, not, ah, precisely… But it’s useful for “context”, lots and lots of context. And, if you pile up enough context, you can bury the actual story. My old chums at The Age in Melbourne produced an especially fine example:Colombo: More than 200 people were killed and hundreds more wounded in eight bomb blasts that rocked churches, luxury hotels and other sites in Sri Lanka on Easter Sunday – the deadliest violence the South Asian island country has seen since a bloody civil war ended a decade ago.Ah, there’s that bloody civil war flaring up all over again, right?

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14107/notre-dame-destruction-christian-europe

Barely an hour after the flames began to rise above Notre Dame — at a time when no explanation could be provided by anyone — the French authorities rushed to say that the fire was an “accident” and that “arson has been ruled out.” The remarks sounded like all the official statements made by the French government after attacks in France during the last decade.

The Notre Dame fire also occurred at a time when attacks against churches in France and Europe have been multiplying. More than 800 churches were attacked in France during the year 2018 alone.

Churches in France are empty. The number of priests is decreasing and the priests that are active in France are either very old or come from Africa or Latin America. The dominant religion in France is now Islam. Every year, churches are demolished to make way for parking lots or shopping centers. Mosques are being built all over, and they are full.

The fire that destroyed much of the Notre Dame Cathedral in the heart of Paris is a tragedy that is irreparable. Even if the cathedral is rebuilt, it will never be what it was before. Stained glass windows and major architectural elements have been severely damaged and the oak frame totally destroyed. The spire that rose from the cathedral was a unique piece of art. It was drawn by the architect who restored the edifice in the nineteenth century, Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, who had based his work on 12th century documents.

In addition to the fire, the water needed to extinguish the flames penetrated the limestone of the walls and façade, and weakened them, making them brittle. The roof is non-existent: the nave, the transept and the choir now lie in open air, vulnerable to bad weather. They cannot even be protected until the structure has been examined thoroughly, a task that will take weeks. Three major elements of the structure (the north transept pinion, the pinion located between the two towers and the vault) are also on the verge of collapse.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/sri-lanka-makes-arrests-in-easter-bombing-attacks-11555918580?mod=cx_picks&cx_navSource=cx_picks&cx_tag=video&cx_artPos=2#cxrecs_s

“Authorities said the government had received warnings that an obscure Islamist militant organization known as National Thowheeth Jama’ath could stage attacks, possibly targeting religious sites or political figures.”

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka—Sri Lankan authorities took 24 people into custody in connection with a series of Easter morning suicide bombing attacks on tourist hotels and churches that killed almost 300 people and injured hundreds of others.

Arrests were made in several locations in and near the capital, where the bombings were focused. There were at least eight explosions on Sunday, most blamed on suicide bombers.

No one has claimed responsibility for the bombings.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/273545/sri-lanka-jihad-massacre-and-decline-west-robert-spencer

Well over two hundred people are dead, and hundreds more injured, in jihad massacres in churches and hotels in Sri Lanka on Easter Sunday morning, and now the usual denial and obfuscation are in full swing. I’m often asked, when I speak around the country, what it will take to wake people up to the nature and gravity of the jihad threat. For all too many people, the answer, as the Sri Lanka attacks abundantly show, is nothing.

The facts were clear enough, at least if one checked the Indian media. India’s News18.com reported that “two of the six attacks that rocked Sri Lanka this morning are reportedly to be have been carried out by suicide bombers,” that telltale sign that this was a jihad attack, with the bombers hoping to claim the Qur’an’s promise of Paradise for those who “kill and are killed” for Allah (9:111). “The attack at Shangri La hotel,” News18 continued, “was carried out by suicide bomber Zahran Hashim, while Abu Mohammad has been identified as the attacker at the Batticalao church.”

The Hindu, meanwhile, reported on another jihad suicide bomber, Mohamed Azzam Mohamed, who “waited patiently in a queue for the Easter Sunday breakfast buffet at Sri Lanka’s Cinnamon Grand hotel before setting off explosives strapped to his back.” Mohamed was “just about to be served when he set off his devastating strike in the packed restaurant, a manager at the Sri Lankan hotel said.”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-massacre-of-christians-11555875924

The Easter Sunday slaughter of Christians in Sri Lanka is a jolting reminder that killers motivated by religious animus continue to be a threat to innocents around the world. Large-scale terror attacks outside the Middle East have been fewer in recent months, but that is due more to the West’s efforts at pre-emption than to any lack of murderous intent.

The explosions hit three churches and hotels known for foreign visitors in or near the capital of Colombo. At this writing at least 207 had been killed and several hundred injured. At least 27 foreigners were among the dead, including “several” Americans, according to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

World leaders are denouncing the attack on “humanity,” but make no mistake: This was an attack on Christians. The killers didn’t pick any random Sunday. The bombs went off at places of worship during services on the holiest day of the Christian calendar. The killers may have taken their bloody cues from the attack on Coptic Christians in Egypt on Palm Sunday in 2017. Police were on watch for a reason outside the church we attended this Easter Sunday morning in New York City, just as they’re often outside synagogues after a terrorist event.

https://www.foxnews.com/world/easter-sunday-explosions-at-multiple-churches-and-hotels-rock-sri-lanka-death-tolls-rises

A pair holding U.S. and British nationalities were among the 11 foreigners killed after a series of explosions struck three churches and three luxury hotels in and just outside of Sri Lanka’s capital Easter Sunday, leaving at least 207 people dead and 450 others injured, officials said.Sri Lanka’s foreign ministry said the other foreigners whose nationalities have been verified included three Indians, one Portuguese national, two Turkish nationals, and three British nationals.The U.S. State Department confirmed in a statement that “several U.S. citizens were among those killed” in the explosions, though details were still emerging. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo went on to condemn the Easter morning “terror attacks.””Attacks on innocent people gathering in a place of worship or enjoying a holiday meal are affronts to the universal values and freedoms that we hold dear, and demonstrate yet again the brutal nature of radical terrorists whose sole aim is to threaten peace and security,” Pompeo said in the statement.The six nearly simultaneous blasts—followed hours later by two more explosions—marked the bloodshed as among the worst since the South Asian country’s 26-year civil war ended a decade ago, a spokesperson for the Sri Lanka police said.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14067/nigeria-jihad-christians

The current violence, which has been getting worse since early 2017, “is slightly different, in that it is a series of targeted attacks on Christian communities attempting to displace farmers and take land for herders.” — Nathan Johnson, International Christian Concern, Regional Manager for Africa.

“Christians in Nigeria are treated as second-class citizens in the twelve northern states, where sharia law is implemented. They are victimized in many ways. Christian girls are kidnapped and forced into marriage to Muslim men. Pastors are abducted for ransom. Churches are vandalized or completely destroyed.” — Nathan Johnson.

“The Nigerian government and the international community… have from the start done little to address the situation. This lack of participation is not surprising: they cannot even acknowledge its roots, namely, the intolerant ideology of jihad. As a result, the death toll of Christians has only risen — and will likely continue to grow exponentially — until such time that this reality is not only acknowledged but addressed.” — Raymond Ibrahim, author and Middle East expert.

Christians are being massacred in Nigeria by Fulani and Boko Haram jihadists — and no one seems to care.

The most severe persecution of these defenseless Christians — who make up half of Nigeria’s total population — has been taking place mostly in the Muslim north of the country, which is governed by sharia law, and in the states known as the “Middle Belt,” which are a transition zone between the northern and southern states.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14091/ayatollah-plays-his-joker

The summoning of Iraqi mercenaries showed that Khamenei isn’t quite sure of the regime’s military and security apparatus and, when the chips are down, relies on his foreign legion.

Soon, however, it became clear that “Islam’s bravest soldier since Imam Ali,” Major-General Qassem Soleimani, owed part of his reputation to bluffing and his talent for self-aggrandizement.

Western gullibility has contributed to overrating a brutal regime and a mediocre leader, thus helping spread the fear that such regimes and leaders rely upon for their survival.

For years, “Iran experts” in the West have regarded the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as the “deep government” in the Islamic Republic. However, the events of the past weeks, marked by floods that wreaked havoc in 22 of Iran’s 31 provinces, may warrant a second look at that theory. The floods showed that, in real terms, Iran has no government and that the IRGC is more of a business-cum-security conglomerate than a government, deep or shallow.

The first week of chaos and confusion showed that, despite boasts by its commanders, the IRGC was unable to organize a credible rescue operation. IRGC chief Gen. Muhammad-Ali Aziz-Jaafari was even unable to travel to the affected provinces. Then came small but ominous protests by flood-stricken people against the IRGC, blaming it, rightly or wrongly, for causing the floods by jerry-building dams and railway lines.