RUTHFULLY YOURS

Nathan Cirillo and Michael Zehaf-Bibeau.

As I noted yesterday, the moral contrast between these two men — the Ottawa terrorist and the guard he shot — couldn’t be more stark. Cirillo gave his life in the service of country and honor. Zehaf-Bibeau gave his life in the service of tyranny and murder.

All those who have died serving Australia, Canada, the U.K., and the U.S. have made a great sacrifice for those respective democracies. Most Westerners honor them with gratitude. Tragically, however, some Westerners are betraying that honor by joining the Islamic State’s global movement.

This societal struggle — against a very small minority of extremists — speaks to a profound philosophical divide.

While the Islamic State claims to represent a new, just, and holy order, its hyper-Salafi jihadist ideology is antithetical to democracy. Where we stand for individual freedom, they stand for totalitarianism. Where we stand for the rule of law, they stand for the tyranny of one psychotic man.

Yet hundreds of Britons, around 100 Canadians, 50 Australians, and 15 Americans are now known to serve the Islamic State. The terror is spreading, and not just in Canada. As events in Australia and Britain attest, Islamic State terrorists in the Mideast and elsewhere are inspiring terrorism from their supporters in the West. Persuading them that serving the Islamic State doesn’t require travel to Syria or Iraq, ISIS offers ordained purpose to those Westerners who detest their democratic society. In basic terms, it turns hateful minds toward violent terrorism. And because of the detection challenge that homegrown terrorists pose for intelligence services, they represent an urgent threat to Western nations’ security. That threat must be met head-on. Treason charges offer one answer.

Of course, it is not a simple answer. While the U.K. is considering treason charges against citizens who join the Islamic State, there is no recent precedent there. The last man convicted of treason in Britain was a Nazi propagandist, Lord Haw-Haw, way back in 1946. Public reaction to new treason trials would obviously be complicated.

Last month, addressing the U.N. General Assembly, Benjamin Netanyahu made a connection between the Islamic State and Hamas. These terrorist entities, Netanyahu said, have a lot in common. Separated by geography, they nonetheless share ideology and tactics and goals: Islamism, terrorism, the destruction of Israel, and the establishment of a global caliphate.

And yet, Netanyahu observed, the very nations now campaigning against the Islamic State treated Hamas like a legitimate combatant during last summer’s Israel–Gaza war. “They evidently don’t understand,” he said, “that ISIS and Hamas are branches of the same poisonous tree.”

The State Department dismissed Netanyahu’s metaphor. “Obviously, we’ve designated both as terrorist organizations,” said spokesman Jen Psaki. “But ISIL poses a different threat to Western interests and to the United States.”

Psaki was wrong, of course. She’s always wrong. And, after the events of the last 48 hours, there ought not to be any doubt as to just how wrong she was. As news broke that a convert to Islam had murdered a soldier and stormed the Canadian parliament, one read of another attack in Jerusalem, where a Palestinian terrorist ran his car over passengers disembarking from light rail, injuring seven, and killing three-month-old Chaya Zissel Braun, who held a U.S. passport.

The Islamic State, al-Qaeda, Hamas — these awful people are literally baby killers. And yet they produce a remarkable amount of dissension, confusion, willful ignorance, and moral equivalence on the part of the men and women who conduct U.S. foreign policy. “ISIL is not ‘Islamic,’” President Obama said of the terrorist army imposing sharia law across Syria and Iraq. “Obviously, we’re shaken by it,” President Obama said of the attack in Canada. “We urge all sides to maintain calm and avoid escalating tensions in the wake of this incident,” the State Department said of the murder of a Jewish child.

“Not Islamic,” despite the fact that the Caliphate grounds its barbarous activities in Islamic law. “Shaken,” not stirred to action. “All sides,” not the side that targets civilians again and again and again. The evasions continue. They create space for the poison tree to grow.

The persistent denial of the ideological unity of Islamic terrorism — the studied avoidance of politically incorrect facts that has characterized our response to the Ford Hood shooting, the Benghazi attack, the Boston Marathon bombing, the march of the caliphate across Syria and Iraq, and the crimes of Hamas — is not random. Behind it is a set of ideas with a long history, and with great purchase among the holders of graduate degrees who staff the Department of Justice, the National Security Council, Foggy Bottom, and the diplomatic corps. These ideas are why, in the words of John McCain, the terrorists “are winning, and we’re not.”

In Modern Times, his sweeping history of the 20th century, Paul Johnson recounts how Einstein’s theory of relativity, a strictly scientific principle, was contorted into relativism, a loopy social phenomenon, through a permanent campaign of serpentine rhetoric. It is, as Roger Kimball explains in The Fortunes of Permanence, a classic example of how a sensible concept or term of art that helps us grasp some narrow aspect of reality can end up distorting reality when ripped from its moorings and broadly applied.

Another good example is “lone wolf.”

Since Thursday afternoon, newscasters have incessantly told us that the late and unlamented Zale Thompson was a “lone wolf.” Thompson was the 32-year-old Muslim from Queens who attacked four New York City police officers with a hatchet on Thursday, breaking one’s arm and critically wounding another with a gash to the head.

Reading off the familiar script, NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton insisted that “nothing we know at this time would indicate” a connection to terrorism. This, despite Thompson’s Facebook page on which he portrayed himself as a mujahed warrior superimposed on Koranic verses and called for “guerilla warfare” against the United States. Evidently, it is just one of those “violent extremism” coincidences that this “lone wolf” strike — translation: non-terrorist strike — occurred soon after the Islamic State urged Muslims in the West to “attack the soldiers of the tyrants and their police force.”

In addition to Americans, Europeans, and Australians, the Islamic State lists the “infidels” of Canada among its enemy “tyrants.” Thompson’s “lone wolf” jihad followed hard upon two separate “lone wolf” attacks in Canada this week. First, Martin Couture-Rouleau plowed a car into two soldiers, killing Warrant Officer Patrice Vincent. Then, Michael Zehaf-Bibeau shot Corporal Nathan Cirillo to death at the National War Memorial in Ottawa before spraying bullets inside Parliament (but fortunately killing no one else). Each “lone wolf” was killed in the aftermath, and each was reportedly a “recent convert to Islam.”

An Arab colloquialism, frequently employed by Arab policy-makers in order to mislead foreign movers and shakers (including American Secretaries of State) suggests that “on words one does not pay customs.”

For instance, on October 16, 2014, Secretary of State John Kerry stated: “I was just in Cairo, where a terrific $5.4bn was raised in order to help rebuild Gaza.” In fact, $5.4bn was not raised; it was verbally pledged against the backdrop of a litany of unfulfilled Arab pledges to help the PLO, Hamas and the Palestinian Authority.

While Secretary Kerry assumes that Arab leaders walk-the-talk when it comes to the Palestinian issue, a July, 2014 study by the Congressional Research Service states: “Routinely, [Arabs] make generous pledges of aid to the Palestinians, but at times fulfill them only in part and after significant delay…. According to Reuters, ‘a high of $1.8bn in foreign aid from Arab countries in 2008 plunged to $600mn in 2012, with Gulf countries scaling back their giving….” The study indicates that since 2008, the US foreign aid to the Palestinians has averaged $400mn annually, more than the oil-rich Saudi Arabia ($260mn in 2013, $100mn in 2012 and $180mn in 2011), the United Arab Emirates ($50mn in 2013) and Kuwait ($50mn in 2013).

The Qatari Al Jazeera reported that “Palestinian officials are skeptical of Arab aid pledges, as few Arab countries carried through on promises last year…. ”

On December 26, 2012, Nabil Elaraby, the Secretary General of the Arab League, divulged that “Arab countries pledged a $100mn monthly safety net to the Palestinian Authority at the March, 2012 Baghdad Arab Summit, but none of it has been realized yet.”

On Wednesday afternoon, Abed al-Rahman Shaludi, a 21-year-old resident of east Jerusalem’s Silwan neighborhood, rammed his car at high speed into a group of people standing at one of the city’s light-rail stations.

After committing this “hit-and-run” terrorist attack, killing 3-month-old Chaya Zissel Braun and wounding eight others, Shaludi ended up crashing into a pole. As he attempted to flee the scene on foot, he was shot by police. He was then taken to Hadassah hospital, where he died.

One of his uncles told reporters that Shaludi was a “normative” person who had merely lost control of his car, and therefore was a victim of cold-blooded murder by Israeli police.

But Shaludi’s record shows otherwise.

He has had two stints in jail — one for 14 months and another for 20 days — for throwing rocks at Jews. In addition, he had ties to Hamas.

Another of his uncles, Mohiyedine Sharif (known as “the electrician” for his expertise in explosives), was responsible for three major bus bombings. He was killed in 1998 in Ramallah, possibly by rivals in Fatah.

In addition, Shaludi had written pro-Hamas posts on his Facebook page, and following Wednesday’s attack, Hamas praised him as a proud member and martyr for their cause.

Internecine rivalries aside, Fatah also hailed Shaludi as a “heroic martyr” in a poster created for this purpose. The poster, which honors Shaludi for having carried out the attack against “settlers in occupied Jerusalem,” was distributed in Silwan. This is not only the neighborhood where Shaludi lived, but also the site of stepped-up Arab violence, due to the recent purchase of a number of homes by Jews. (Though Arabs are free to live anywhere in Israel, Jews are not welcome to reside among Arabs).

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas of creating the climate of incitement which led to the attack, one of many incidents of violence in the Israeli capital of late.

Editor’s Note (Oct 16): See the statement released today by CIDRAP related to this commentary.

Editor’s Note (Sep 17): Today’s commentary was submitted to CIDRAP by the authors, who are national experts on respiratory protection and infectious disease transmission. In May they published a similar commentary on MERS-CoV. Dr Brosseau is a Professor and Dr Jones an Assistant Professor in the School of Public Health, Division of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences, at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Authors’ disclaimer: This commentary reflects the personal opinions of the authors. It does not represent the opinion of the University of Illinois at Chicago or any other organization. The authors have not received any compensation for the preparation of this commentary or any associated public statements. The authors do not endorse any specific manufacturer or brand of personal protective equipment (PPE) and have no direct or indirect financial interest in the use of a specific brand of PPE. In the past one or both of the authors have received research funding from numerous government agencies and organizations, including 3M.
Healthcare workers play a very important role in the successful containment of outbreaks of infectious diseases like Ebola. The correct type and level of personal protective equipment (PPE) ensures that healthcare workers remain healthy throughout an outbreak—and with the current rapidly expanding Ebola outbreak in West Africa, it’s imperative to favor more conservative measures.

The precautionary principle—that any action designed to reduce risk should not await scientific certainty—compels the use of respiratory protection for a pathogen like Ebola virus that has:

No proven pre- or post-exposure treatment modalities
A high case-fatality rate
Unclear modes of transmission

We believe there is scientific and epidemiologic evidence that Ebola virus has the potential to be transmitted via infectious aerosol particles both near and at a distance from infected patients, which means that healthcare workers should be wearing respirators, not facemasks.1

I begin this column by offering a measure of what I choose to uphold what ought to be a standard of esthetics, at least in portraiture. It is by no means my only measure, but it does reflect a person I once knew, and who is still close to my conception of a romantic ideal. If she is reading this, she will recognize herself.

Lady Agnew of Lochnaw is a luxuriant representation of the kind of woman a man ought to want: In the frank, steadfast glance at her auditor is the knowledge of how she is being regarded, that knowledge shamelessly obvious in the set of her eyes and face, in the quiet confidence of her bearing, in her total expression. It is, from my own perspective, at least, a seductive, come-hither look. The hues of her satin gown, the purple sash, and the relaxed set of her arms, the surrounding colors of the armchair, the neutral background, in terms of composition, together all highlight and are all calculated to guide one’s glance to the focal point, that unforgettable, alluring face….

I have other such conceptions. Some are photographic, others cinematic. But Lady Agnew has been anchored in my gallery most of my adult life. A framed reproduction of it hangs on one of my walls. Two of my fictional characters are also painters and portraitists, literary versions of my projection of a romantic ideal: Stella Dawn in Run From Judgment, and Dilys Jones-Skeen in the Cyrus Skeen detective novels.

Well, enough of that. My point here is that this caliber of art has virtually vanished. There are some capable, unsung artists able to produce that quality of portraiture, but they are invisible to the cultural establishment, and if recognized, then shunned, banished, and deprecated. I happen to know at least two such artists, but only one has a website.

Kerry treacherously crossed a redline in a calculated move that should send chills down the spine of every thinking person.In all fairness, it’s not just the Obama administration which is fond of insinuating that somehow Israel is to blame for all that ails the Mideast.

This has been the underlying theme of the US State Department since Israel’s birth in 1948.

The variations in the stance vis-à-vis Israel derive from the intensity of antipathy – the subtlety and sophistication of the tone in which it’s expressed. Given its strident hectoring, the Obama administration is doubtless America’s least-subtle and least-sophisticated ever.

While past presidents and their secretaries of state took greater pains to pretend not to side with glaring Arab anti-Israel falsehoods, such niceties are all but absent from Barack Obama’s and John Kerry’s rhetoric.

Anti-Israel idioms and calumnies are repeated by them as an obvious and infallible politically-correct gospel.

And thus Kerry had the colossal gall last week – significantly at a White House ceremony for the Muslim fest of Id al-Adha – to claim no less that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (i.e. the Jewish state’s struggle for survival) bolsters the mass appeal of Islamic State radicalism.

Ya’alon’s requests to meet with Secretary of State Kerry, Vice President Biden in Washington were turned down this week

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Obama administration this week refused Israel defense minister’s requests to meet several top national security aides, still miffed over negative comments he made about Secretary of State John Kerry’s Mideast peace efforts and nuclear negotiations with Iran, US officials said Friday.

While Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon did see Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and US Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power, the officials said the White House and State Department rejected Israeli proposals for meetings with Vice President Joe Biden, national security adviser Susan Rice and Kerry on his five-day trip to the United States. The administration had sought to stop Ya’alon from seeing Power but the objections were made too late to cancel the meeting, according to the officials.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the snubs, which were first reported by several Israeli media outlets.

Their comments were reported hours after publication of a report by the Israeli news-site Ynet, which said Ya’alon had been denied the meetings because the US administration was settling scores with Ya’alon for statements he made in January in which he called Kerry “obsessive” and “messianic” about Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, which came to an abrupt halt in April. Ya’alon also privately derided Kerry’s security proposals for an Israeli pullout from the West Bank.

Where Turkey stands today is a perfect example of how, when Islamists — mild or otherwise — rule a county, even the most basic liberties are systematically suppressed.

“A climate of fear has emerged in Turkey.” — Hasam Kilic, President, Turkey’s Constitutional Court.

The prosecutor demanded a heavier penalty for the victim than for her torturers.

The European Commission identified government interference in the judiciary and bans imposed on social media as the major sources of concern regarding Turkey’s candidacy for full membership.

“We have made the conservative, pious [Muslim] masses not just a part, but a major actor of the political system.” Thus said Turkey’s Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, not even trying to hide his pride.

Where Turkey stands today is a perfect example of how, when Islamists — mild or otherwise — rule a country, even the most basic liberties are systematically suppressed. The seal of approval for the terrible failure of what U.S. President Barack Obama once called a “successful Muslim democracy” came from the country’s top judge.

Hasim Kilic, President of Turkey’s Constitutional Court, and himself a conservative, recently said that, “A climate of fear has emerged in Turkey;” and he called on the Turks “to resist [it], and not give up.” It is not always easy to do so.