https://jamieglazov.com/2018/11/03/glazov-moment-female-genital-mutilators-flown
In this new Jamie Glazov Moment, Jamie focuses on Female Genital Mutilators Flown Into UK, and he asks: Where is #MeToo? Where are all the leftist feminists?
Don’t miss it!
And make sure to watch Elizabeth Yore, the Founder of EndFGMToday.com, discuss End FGM Today, where she reveals how 513,000 girls and women are at risk in the U.S. alone:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/turtle-bay-truth-embargo-1541202078
The United Nations has again proved its worth as an unfailing barometer of human rights—though not in the way the world body intended.
It came in Thursday’s 189-2 vote against the trade embargo on Cuba, blamed by regime apologists for most of Cuba’s many ills. Israel alone sided with the U.S. The resolution on the embargo pops up every year. And every year since 1992 the U.S. has voted against it—except in 2016 when the U.S. abstained because the Obama Administration was cozying up to Havana.
This year U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley tried something different. Instead of simply voting no, the U.S. tried to inject some balance by proposing several amendments that highlighted the many egregious outrages of the Cuban regime. These range from its denial of fundamental freedoms of assembly and expression to the harassment and intimidation of government opponents to the jailing of citizens who dare complain about human-rights violations. All eight amendments failed by overwhelming margins, with only Israel and Ukraine consistently voting with the U.S.
Ms. Haley noted who bears the real costs of this high-minded preening. “It’s one more time that countries feel they can poke the United States in the eye, but you’re not hurting the United States when you do this,” she said. “You’re literally hurting the Cuban people by telling the regime that their treatment of their people is acceptable.”
People can come down on different sides about the merits of an economic embargo. But when the U.N. condemns the U.S. while giving Cuba a pass, Turtle Bay reveals its own moral bankruptcy.
https://quillette.com/2018/11/01/the-gulag
Editor’s note: The following essay is Jordan B. Peterson’s new foreword to the new edition of The Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (Penguin, November 2018, 544 pages). Reproduced with the kind permission of the author.
Once we have taken up the word, it is thereafter impossible to turn away: A writer is no detached judge of his countrymen and contemporaries; he is an accomplice to all the evil committed in his country or by his people. And if the tanks of his fatherland have bloodied the pavement of a foreign capital, then rust-colored stains have forever bespattered the writer’s face. And if on some fateful night a trusting Friend is strangled in his sleep—then the palms of the writer bear the bruises from that rope. And if his youthful fellow citizens nonchalantly proclaim the advantages of debauchery over humble toil, if they abandon themselves to drugs, or seize hostages—then this stench too is mingled with the breath of the writer. Have we the insolence to declare that we do not answer for the evils of today’s world?…
The simple act of an ordinary brave man is not to participate in lies, not to support false actions! His rule: Let that come into the world, let it even reign supreme—only not through me. But it is within the power of writers and artists to do much more: to defeat the lie! For in the struggle with lies art has always triumphed and shall always triumph! Visibly, irrefutably for all! Lies can prevail against much in this world, but never against art…
One word of truth shall outweigh the whole world.
–From the speech delivered by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn to the Swedish Academy on the occasion of his acceptance of the Nobel Prize for Literature.
* * *
First, you defend your homeland against the Nazis, serving as a twice-decorated soldier on the Eastern front in the criminally ill- prepared Soviet Red Army. Then, you’re arrested, humiliated, stripped of your military rank, charged under the auspices of the all-purpose Article 58 with the dissemination of “anti-Soviet propaganda,” and dragged off to Moscow’s infamous Lubyanka prison. There, through the bars of your cell, you watch your beloved country celebrating its victory in the Great Patriotic War. Then you’re sentenced, in absentia, to eight years of hard labor (but you got away easy; it wasn’t so long afterward that people in your position were awarded a “tenner”—and then a quarter of a century!). And fate isn’t finished with you, yet—not by any means. You develop a deadly cancer in the camp, endure the exile imposed on you after your imprisonment ends, and pass very close to death.
https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/pompeo-sanctions-just-a-part-of-iran-regime-behavior-change-plan/
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said this morning that snapback sanctions on Iran will be “just a part of the U.S. government’s total effort to change the behavior of the Ayatollah Khamenei” and the regime in Tehran.
Sanctions on Iran’s energy, shipbuilding, shipping and banking sectors that were lifted as a result of the P5+1 nuclear deal will go back into effect Monday, Pompeo told reporters on a call.
Eight countries, though, are receiving waivers that will allow them to keep buying oil from Iran without coming under U.S. sanctions: Pompeo did not identify the countries, but Bloomberg reported that four are Japan, India, China and South Korea.
“We expect to issue some temporary allotments to eight jurisdictions, but only because they have demonstrated significant reductions in their crude oil and cooperation on many other fronts and have made important moves towards getting to zero crude oil importation. These negotiations are still ongoing,” Pompeo said. “Two of the jurisdictions will completely end imports as part of their agreements. The other six will import at greatly reduced levels.”
He stressed that “our actions today are targeted at the regime, not the people of Iran who have suffered grievously under this regime”; the U.S. “will maintain many humanitarian exemptions to our sanctions, including food, agriculture commodities, medicine and medical devices.”
Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said the U.S. has “gone after the financial networks that the Iranian regime uses to fuel its terrorist proxies in Hezbollah and Hamas, to fund the Houthis in Yemen, and to support the brutal Assad regime in Syria.”
On Monday, Treasury will add more than 700 names to the list of blocked entities, he said, which includes “hundreds of targets previously granted sanctions relief under the JCPOA, as well as more than 300 new designations.”
Senate Republicans including Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) want the administration to cut off Iranian banks from conducting global transactions using the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, and are expected to introduced legislation to force President Trump’s hand after the election. CONTINUE AT SITE
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/13211/iraq-christians-returning
“Something specific occurred here that requires a specific response. It is called genocide… It is important for these communities to understand that they have a superpower behind them. This is a White House priority. Our goal is to help those communities return to their historic lands.” — Max Primorac, Special Representative for Minority Assistance Programs at USAID, who is responsible for aiding Christians and Yazidis targeted by ISIS.
While roughly a third of the Christians who fled from ISIS in 2014 are returning, the future of their communities in northern Iraq needs political support and a surge of security and economic development. For Christians worldwide, this is our homeland. This is where we began. These are the people we need to protect and help to prosper.
QARAQOSH, Iraq — Christians are gradually returning to their historic homeland in northern Iraq, after three years of ISIS occupation.
The lucky ones managed to flee before the ISIS onslaught in the pre-dawn hours of August 6, 2014, and returned to find their houses intact. Most, however, are facing tremendous damage to their homes and families from a war that pitted neighbor against neighbor, community against community, tearing apart bonds forged over generations.
Yohanna Younis Towaya, 54, a prominent businessman and farmer, returned to find his home burned and looted. “One wall, next to my father’s house, was completely blown out but we repaired it,” he says. His father’s house, next door, he says, has been flattened by an allied air strike: ISIS fighters turned it into a fighting post.
Towaya says he doubts he will ever rebuild his father’s house, like the 116 such buildings in this once-thriving Christian economic center. “ISIS fighters are buried there beneath the rubble,” he says. “Sometimes, you can smell them.”
The smell of the unburied dead is pungent. You can smell it from here in the Christian heartland all the way into ancient Mosul, 12 miles to the west. The area was totally devastated in the final battle to crush ISIS hold-outs fighting from tunnels and underground bunkers.
No one really knows who provided ISIS with their tunneling machines, but there are many of them. On the outskirts of Qaraqosh, members of ISIS had dug a maze of tunnels beneath a Syriac Orthodox monastery at Qortaya to an ancient Assyrian mound 150 meters away. Those firing positions, high enough for an ordinary person to walk upright, allowed them to dominate the surrounding plains.
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/13190/britain-terror-investigations
If you do not even dare to link terrorism to its source, then surely neither can you prepare for it.
No one seems to be holding roundtable talks with non-Muslim communities across the UK to address their legitimate fears and concerns about religiously-motivated terrorism on their lives.
Perhaps the main reason that terror victims had nowhere to turn is that even after years of living with Islamic terrorism, British authorities and public services still appear to be more concerned with dealing with perceived “Islamophobia” than with the real, devastating consequences of terrorism.
Britain’s Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation, Max Hill, recently recommended:
“…the Police should consider and reflect upon the community impact of a large-scale [terror] investigation, centering as it did on particular areas of Manchester with a large Muslim population… Good community policing, as well as good counter-terrorism policing, demands that real efforts are made to work within and with local communities, where many blameless residents will have been inconvenienced if not traumatised by the regular appearance of Police search and arrest teams on their street or in their home. I would like to see the outcome of Police reflections on this aspect…” [Emphasis added]
Hill’s recommendation was published in his recent report on how the UK handles its counter-terrorism efforts. In the report, Hill examines police investigations of the major 2017 terrorist attacks; his recommendation was connected to the investigation into the terrorist attack in Manchester in May 2017, in which Salman Abedi murdered 22 people and injured 139, half of them children, at an Ariana Grande pop concert at the Manchester Arena.
https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/haley-cuba-vote-just-one-more-time-un-members-feel-they-can-poke-u-s-in-the-eye/
Ambassador Nikki Haley lashed out at the United Nations’ annual condemnation of the U.S. embargo on Cuba as “one more time that countries feel they can poke the United States in the eye.”
“You are literally hurting the Cuban people by telling the regime that their treatment of their people is acceptable. For 27 years we’ve had this debate, and nothing has changed in Cuba – at least nothing for the better,” she told members. “…The sorry state of liberty and human rights in Cuba is not lost on anyone in this chamber – even as countries vote to blindly support the resolution every year.”
The resolution calling on the U.S. to lift the embargo was first introduced in 1992 and has passed overwhelmingly each year. This year the vote was 189-2, with the U.S. and Israel opposing.
In 2016, when the Obama administration was trying to forge better relations with the communist country, both the U.S. and Israel abstained during the vote.
Haley said proponents of the resolution “falsely blame America for all kinds of evil things, even genocide.”
“Those who support this resolution every year have it wrong. Our reason for the embargo is and has always been Cuba’s denial of freedom and the denial of the most basic human rights for the Cuban people. The United States will continue to stand with the Cuban people until their rights and their freedoms are restored. Period. We won’t back down,” she added. “Last year, we were joined by just one nation in voting against this resolution. And that’s fine. We were in very good company. We have no problem standing alone on behalf of the things that we believe in and will proudly do so again today if necessary.”
During a speech today at Miami Dade College’s National Historic Landmark Freedom Tower, National Security Advisor John Bolton warned that “in Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, we see the perils of poisonous ideologies left unchecked, and the dangers of domination and suppression.”
“The ‘Troika of Tyranny’ in this hemisphere — Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua — has finally met its match,” he added.
Regarding the mysterious “sonic attacks” that have driven most U.S. diplomats from Havana and caused illness including traumatic brain injury, Bolton vowed that “this president will not allow our diplomats to be targeted with impunity.” Cuba has denied being behind the attacks.
Haley said at the UN that “for 27 years we’ve had this debate, and nothing has changed in Cuba – at least nothing for the better.”
https://www.wsj.com/articles/judge-who-oversaw-corruption-probe-to-be-named-brazils-justice-minister-1541083888?mod=cx_picks&cx_navSource=cx_picks&cx_tag=undefined&cx_artPos=4#cxrecs_s
Brazil’s President-elect Jair Bolsonaro picked the country’s crusading anticorruption judge to be justice minister, signaling that Latin America’s largest nation will step up its battle against endemic graft but fueling criticism of the judiciary among his opponents.
Mr. Bolsonaro said Thursday that Sergio Moro had accepted his invitation to head a beefed-up version of the justice ministry from January 1, which will also give Mr. Moro control over the country’s efforts to combat spiraling violence that saw nearly 64,000 people slain last year.
“His agenda against corruption and organized crime, as well as his respect for the Constitution and the law, will be our guiding principle,” Mr. Bolsonaro said on Twitter.
In a note sent by the Bolsonaro transition team, Mr. Moro was quoted as saying that his appointment means “consolidating the advances of the past few years against crime and corruption and reducing the risks of going backwards,” and adding that he made the decision for “the greater good.”
The appointment of the widely-respected judge as minister is considered by legal experts to be a stamp of approval for the future government of Mr. Bolsonaro, who swept to victory Sunday with his promise to restore law and order.
But the move has also fueled criticism of partisanship in the country’s vast Car Wash corruption investigation that Mr. Moro helped lead, adding weight to accusations by the leftist Workers’ Party that the operation was part of a soft coup by the right to seize power. CONTINUE AT SITE
http://acdemocracy.org/mohamad-fakih
The forty-seven years old Mohamad Abdallah Fakih (محمد عبدالله فقيه) is the founder and CEO of Paramount Fine Foods, a Middle Eastern restaurants and food chain operating in Canada, USA (Florida, New York), UK (London – Paddington, Brixton and Gloucester), Lebanon (Beirut), Pakistan (Karachi), and the Ivory Coast (Abidjan).
Fakih’s relationship with Justin Trudeau seems very close. Trudeau was invited several times to Paramount Fine Foods, and he has joined the Canadian Primer’s political and charitable activities. Fakih called Trudeau “my good friend,” and said “ I have personal and direct relationship with Justin Trudeau.” Trudeau called Fakih “my friend” and “the best of Canada.”
On the occasion of Paramount Fine Food’s tenth anniversary, Trudeau sent his greetings in video:
“Mohamad my friend, congratulations to you and to the whole team at Paramount on your tenth anniversary. In just a short decade you’ve made your mark in Toronto North America and around the world. Your success speaks to your passion commitment and dedication. By now we know the quality of your food is outstanding but your commitment to making a difference and helping people is nothing short of inspiring… Congratulations again here’s to many more decades of success.”
Fakih responded: “Paramount Fine Foods is honoured to receive this special message for our 10th Anniversary from our Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau Thank you Mohamad Fakih.”
Born in Tairdebba, the small Shiite village in south Lebanon – home also to Imad Mughniyeh, former Hezbollah Chief Commander – Mohamad Fakih has managed skillfully to translate his meteoric business success to political power by establishing close relationship not only with Canada’s prime minister Justin Trudeau, but also with other Liberal ministers, members of Parliament and local politicians.
Dismissing the idea of entering politics, it appears that Fakih favours rubbing shoulders with people in power to promote his community and business targets, as well as his political agenda.
For the Liberal Party Fakih is a one of the most valuable political asset that can help in mobilizing the Muslim and the Arab communities to vote for reelection of the Trudeau government in 2019 elections.
But Fakih should reconsider his partnership with Islamic Relief Worldwide and Islamic Relief Canada. Tom Quiggin, a Canadian intelligence expert, has recently sent to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police a request to launch a investigation into financing terrorism. It is based on a new report that shows that Members of Parliament and Ministers have been sending taxpayers’ money to organizations that fund extremism and terrorism. According to Quiggin, one such organization is Islamic Relief Canada, which recived funds from a variety of government programs.
http://www.atimes.com/article/china-leads-market-recovery-as-predicted-trade-deal-em
Trump signals progress in talks after US stocks plunge in October
The popular large-cap China ETF (ticker FXI) led the S&P 500 during the market uptick of the past several days, driven by signals from Beijing and Washington that a resolution of the Sino-American trade dispute was possible.
President Trump this morning tweeted that he had made progress on trade negotiations with China, and had spoken by telephone with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping.
Donald J. Trump✔@realDonaldTrump
“Just had a long and very good conversation with President Xi Jinping of China. We talked about many subjects, with a heavy emphasis on Trade. Those discussions are moving along nicely with meetings being scheduled at the G-20 in Argentina. Also had good discussion on North Korea!”
The October plunge in US equity prices, as well as weakness in recent US economic data, give the Trump Administration an incentive to reach a resolution with China.
As I reported from Beijing October 23, China is looking for a framework for a trade deal that would allow Trump to claim credit for better protection for American intellectual property as well as changes in China’s industrial policy. China may tone down its rhetoric about dominating high-tech industries under the “Made in China 2025” program, source of contention with the United States, although it will not abandon its economic goals.
I predicted October 25 that the slumping stock market would motivate the Trump Administration to seek a deal with China.
The October manufacturing survey of the Institute for Supply Management released Nov. 1 showed weaker-than-expected growth in US industry. The index fell from 58.8 to 56.8 while new orders fell from 61.8 to 57.4, and prices paid rose from 69.0 to 71.4. The numbers reflect the percentage of respondents who see expansion vs. contraction and came in far below the consensus of economic forecasters.
The Institute told Bloomberg news that tariffs are a concern to more than 40% of respondents in the broad-based survey. “Import tariffs and counter-tariffs are the biggest inhibitor to the expansion in manufacturing,” ISM official Timothy Fiore said.
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