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Jeremy Corbyn, a Pro-Terrorist Prime Minister? by Denis MacEoin

Posted By on June 3rd, 2019

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14299/corbyn-pro-terrorist-prime-minister

Sadly, ever since Corbyn’s unexpected election as leader in 2015 and the rapid growth in the numbers of far-left members who adulate him, antisemitism has become the core identifying characteristic of the Labour Party.

The evidence for massive antisemitism and anti-Zionism (in breach of some clauses in the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance Definition of Antisemitism, recognized after a long struggle by the Labour Party) within Labour ranks has been building for over two years.

“The dossier details 100,000 emails, including tens of thousands showing how Labour ignored complaints that supporters promoted anti-Semitism, the former staffers told Private Eye…. The protection of anti-Semites was on a scale and at a level that the public does not begin to understand.” – Claire Ellicott, Daily Mail, May 16, 2019.

It is hard not to notice that the political system in the United Kingdom has been left badly broken over the past few months. Not a day goes by without fresh news about the worsening division between one half of the country that demands we leave the European Union and the other half that is campaigning for us to remain. Prime Minister Theresa May, before announcing her resignation on June 7th, has been stubborn almost to the point of lunacy. Attempts to reach a compromise deal on Brexit with the country’s opposition, the Labour Party, broke down entirely after a few weeks.

In local elections on May 3, the ruling Conservatives lost 1,334 council seats, with Labour (whose members had hoped to gain) losing 82. The Remain- supporting centrist party, the Liberal Democrats, did best, adding 703 seats.

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Making Sense of the European Elections by Soeren Kern

Posted By on June 3rd, 2019

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14331/understanding-european-elections

The election results reflect a generational shift and suggest that European politics increasingly will be dominated by ideological clashes over two competing mega-issues: the fight against climate change championed by the pro-EU globalists; and the opposition to mass migration and multiculturalism led by the anti-EU national populists.

“Of the five individual political parties with the biggest representation in the new European Parliament, four are anti-European Union.” — Ivan Krastev, Bulgarian analyst, The New York Times.

“The social institutions have long been dominated by sympathizers of the Greens — especially the media and education, but also the churches. That 37% of first-time voters now vote for the Greens is also a consequence of the fact that in schools green creeds are propagated as certainties of modern education…. The awareness of what market economy/capitalism is and should be has almost completely disappeared in Germany.” — Rainer Zitelmann, German historian, The European.

Mainstream center-left and center-right parties — especially in Britain, France and Germany — performed poorly in European parliamentary elections held between May 23-26. The traditional centrist duopoly lost its majority in the next European Parliament, which opens on July 2 and will sit for five years, until 2024.

Most of the political vacuum left by the so-called legacy parties was filled by Greens and pro-European Union liberals. Pro-EU parties will control around 75% of the seats in the 751-seat European Parliament.

Anti-EU nationalist parties made important gains — especially in Belgium, Britain, France, Hungary, Italy and Poland — but fell short of expectations. Euroskeptic parties will hold around 25% of the seats in the next European Parliament.

The election results reflect a generational shift and suggest that European politics increasingly will be dominated by ideological clashes over two competing mega-issues: the fight against climate change championed by the pro-EU globalists; and the opposition to mass migration and multiculturalism led by the anti-EU national populists.

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For 2nd straight day, Israel strikes military targets in Syria

Posted By on June 3rd, 2019

https://www.israelhayom.com/2019/06/03/for-second-straight-day-israel-strikes-military-targets-in-syria/

Israel fired missiles at a Syrian military air base in the country’s center late Sunday, killing at least one soldier and wounding two others, hours after another Israeli strike in southern Syria, which came in response to a rocket attack on the Israeli Golan Heights. Sunday’s strike killed three soldiers and wounded seven, Syria’s state-run media said.

Unconfirmed reports said Monday that five soldiers were killed in the strike, three of them Syrian.

According to Syrian media, the Israeli strike targeted the T4 air base in the central province of Homs – long used by Iranian forces in Syria – just before midnight Sunday. There was no immediate comment from Israel about striking the air base.

Syrian state TV quoted an unidentified military official as saying that one soldier was killed and two others were wounded in the strike and that an arms depot was hit as well. Israel has attacked the T4 base in the past.

Earlier Sunday, the IDF confirmed it targeted several military positions in southern Syria, including two artillery batteries, several observation and intelligence posts and an SA2 air defense unit, in response to two rockets launched from Syria late on Saturday, which caused no casualties.

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Israel Heads Again to Elections as One Politician Gambles It All : David Isaac

Posted By on June 3rd, 2019

https://freebeacon.com/blog/israel-heads-again-to-elections-as-one-politician-gambles-it-all/

Five weeks after being sworn in, the 21st Knesset voted to dissolve itself. It’s a first for Israeli politics; the country has never held back-to-back elections. Two freshman legislators even burst into tears. One man, Avigdor Liberman, is responsible for both the most recent April 9 elections and the new elections to be held Sept. 17. The question is why? Consensus is building that Liberman brought down the previous government (when he resigned as defense minister) and refused to join a new one in a bid to put himself back on the political map as his influence fades.

Liberman refused to join the government over a proposed military conscription bill for ultra-Orthodox Jews, or haredim (literally “ones who tremble” before God). Liberman’s position—that not one clause of the bill be touched—was first viewed as merely an opening position that would soften as the weeks went by. Up to last week’s Wednesday midnight deadline, there was a lingering belief that a last-minute deal would be struck.

But Liberman refused to budge, leaving Netanyahu one seat short of the 61 Knesset seats he needed to form a government.

Netanyahu, visibly furious, in a kind of verbal excommunication, announced to the press on Wednesday that Liberman was “on the left now,” calling him “a serial destroyer of right-wing governments.”

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London Mayor Sadiq Khan Says Welcoming Trump is “Un-British” Daniel Greenfield

Posted By on June 3rd, 2019

https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/273899/islamic-terror-defender-sadiq-khan-says-welcoming-daniel-greenfield

If you believe London city boss Sadiq Khan, he’s more British than the Queen for opposing Trump.

In an unhinged Guardian post, Sadiq Khan, a former lawyer for the Nation of Islam and defender of assorted Islamic terrorists, compares Trump to Putin, Kim Jong-Un, and “a growing global threat”.

“It’s so un-British to be rolling out the red carpet this week for a formal state visit for a president whose divisive behaviour flies in the face of the ideals America was founded upon – equality, liberty and religious freedom,” Khan whines.

Those are the same ideals that Islam firmly rejects.

Khan ought to know something about that.

In 2001 he was the lawyer for the Nation of Islam in its successful High Court bid to overturn the 15-year-ban on its leader, Louis Farrakhan.

In 2005 and 2006 he visited terror-charged Babar Ahmad in Woodhill Prison. Mr. Ahmed was extradited to the U.S. in 2012, serving time in prison before being returned to the UK in 2015. Mr. Ahmed pleaded guilty to the terrorist offences of conspiracy and providing material support to the Taliban.

And Mr. Khan also campaigned for the release and repatriation of Shaker Aamer, Britain’s last Guantanamo detainee, who was returned to the UK in November.

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The Gaza Conundrum The sooner Israel rids itself of the Hamas menace, the better. Ari Lieberman

Posted By on June 3rd, 2019

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/273889/gaza-conundrum-ari-lieberman

Like an open sore that refuses to heel, Gaza continues to be a thorn in Israel’s side. Though things remain on simmer for now, a full scale conflagration against Hamas and its junior affiliate, Islamic Jihad, is inevitable. As if to underscore this point, on Thursday, Hamas leader, Yahya Sinwar, announced that his group’s rocket capabilities have improved, and threatened that Hamas would not hesitate to launch rockets at Tel Aviv if attacked. He also stated that Hamas-orchestrated protests along the Gaza border would continue and intensify. Tellingly, Sinwar noted that Hamas receives financial and military support from Iran and that but for Iranian assistance, Hamas would not have been able to improve its military capabilities to the level where it’s at today.

Israel is accustomed to such belligerent talk from its enemies, which is often more bark than bite. Nonetheless, Israel’s leaders have every reason to take these types of threats seriously. A miscalculation by Hamas can instantly trigger a wider conflict.

Hamas has two immediate goals. The first is to hold on to the reins of power at all costs. Hamas does this by controlling Gaza with an iron fist, brutally suppressing all forms of dissent. But the terror group also needs to pay the salaries of those who ensure the regime’s survival. To this end, it relies on cash handouts from entities like Qatar and Iran, as well as taxes on goods smuggled in tunnels between Gaza and northern Sinai, and other extortion schemes.

Hamas’s second goal is to maintain relevancy. Wider issues affecting the Mideast, such as the Shia-Sunni divide, Iran’s quest for nuclear weapons, the Islamic State, and proxy wars in Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Libya have regulated Gaza and the Palestinian issue at large to third tier. Hamas addresses this problem by causing disruption and mischief. To this end, Hamas employs various schemes to keep itself in the news cycle. But the terror group recognizes that it cannot push the envelope too far lest it incur the full brunt of the Israel Defense Forces and invite disaster upon itself.

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US Ambassador to Germany Appears At Counterprotest to Anti-Israel Rally Daniel Greenfield

Posted By on June 3rd, 2019

https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/273905/us-ambassador-germany-appears-counterprotest-anti-daniel-greenfield

“Richard Grenell, America’s ambassador to Germany in the Trump era, is infuriating Europeans by standing up to Muslim anti-Semitism.”

Obama’s European ambassadors justified Islamic anti-Semitism.

 “A distinction should be made between traditional anti-Semitism, which should be condemned and Muslim hatred for Jews, which stems from the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians,” Howard Gutman, Obama’s disgraced ambassador to Belgium, had argued.

Richard Grenell, America’s ambassador to Germany in the Trump era, is infuriating Europeans by standing up to Muslim anti-Semitism.

Here he is participating in a counterprotest to the Al Quds hate rally and urging Merkel to ban the Islamic terror group, Hezbollah.

Merkel appears to be less than enthusiastic.

When asked on Wednesday by The Jerusalem Post numerous times if the German government – in response to a demand by the nearly 100,000-member Central Council of Jews – plans to ban the Lebanese Shi’ite terrorist organization, Merkel and Seehofer refused to answer.

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Somalis have Changed Minneapolis By Sunny Lohman

Posted By on June 3rd, 2019

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2019/06/somalis_have_changed_minneapolis.html

Everyone not lying to themselves predicted when the federal government under Bill Clinton – aided and abetted by Lutheran Social Services, Catholic Charities and World Relief Minnesota — plopped 30,000 Somalis down into the midst of the kind, virtue-signaling, eager-to-help Midwesterners of Minneapolis (of which I am one) that it would lead to some grave consequences for our community.

Now, due to continuing refugee placements as well as chain migration there are an estimated 80,000 Somalis living in the Twin Cities metro area, or more like 79,000 if you subtract those who’ve left the country to join terrorist organizations like ISIS.

Anyhoo, here’s a week Minneapolitans had with their Somali neighbors last month:

On Wednesday, May 15th a couple of University students were attacked on campus at the East Bank Train station by two Somali thugs. It was an attempted robbery that the guys rebuffed sustaining injuries that required a hospital visit.

On Thursday, May 16th two Somalis burned down the pavilion at Lake Calhoun [or Lake Bde Maka Ska if you’re a virtue signaler) an eating and hanging out meeting place in the heart of the city enjoyed by generations of Americans around the prettiest city lake you’ve ever seen. This is in the most expensive neighborhood in Minneapolis.

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Alone The decline of the family has unleashed an epidemic of loneliness. Kay S. Hymowitz

Posted By on June 3rd, 2019

https://www.city-journal.org/decline-of-family-loneliness-epidemic

Americans are suffering from a bad case of loneliness. The number of people in the United States living alone has gone through the studio-apartment roof. A study released by the insurance company Cigna last spring made headlines with its announcement: “Only around half of Americans say they have meaningful, daily face-to-face social interactions.” Loneliness, public-health experts tell us, is killing as many people as obesity and smoking. It’s not much comfort that Americans are not, well, alone in this. Germans are lonely, the bon vivant French are lonely, and even the Scandinavians—the happiest people in the world, according to the UN’s World Happiness Report—are lonely, too. British prime minister Theresa May recently appointed a “Minister of Loneliness.”

The hard evidence for a loneliness epidemic admittedly has some issues. How is loneliness different from depression? How much do living alone and loneliness overlap? Do social scientists know how to compare today’s misery with that in, say, the mid-twentieth century, a period that produced prominent books like The Lonely Crowd? Certainly, some voguish explanations for the crisis should raise skepticism: among the recent suspects are favorite villains like social media, technology, discrimination, genetic bad luck, and neoliberalism.

Still, the loneliness thesis taps into a widespread intuition of something true and real and grave. Foundering social trust, collapsing heartland communities, an opioid epidemic, and rising numbers of “deaths of despair” suggest a profound, collective discontent. It’s worth mapping out one major cause that is simultaneously so obvious and so uncomfortable that loneliness observers tend to mention it only in passing. I’m talking, of course, about family breakdown. At this point, the consequences of family volatility are an evergreen topic when it comes to children; this remains the subject of countless papers and conferences. Now, we should take account of how deeply the changes in family life of the past 50-odd years are intertwined with the flagging well-being of so many adults and communities.

FOREIGN POLICY Comments turned off

Iran Puts Trump to the Test He’s restored U.S. credibility. Now he needs to maintain it. By Michael Makovsky

Posted By on June 3rd, 2019

https://www.wsj.com/articles/iran-puts-trump-to-the-test-11559507350

President Trump’s Iran policy has so far been effective at keeping the regime off balance. He especially distinguished himself by defying conventional opinion and withdrawing from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, the 2015 nuclear agreement with Iran, and imposing painful economic sanctions, which have undercut Tehran’s finances and exacerbated internal pressures.

But American reliance on sanctions, which Iran has weathered in the past, signals an unwillingness for confrontation. Tehran is pushing back. First, it announced it would stop abiding by certain JCPOA restrictions on its nuclear program. Second, despite Mr. Trump’s warnings and swift deployment of U.S. assets to the region, Iran-backed forces sabotaged oil tankers off the Emirati coast and a Saudi pipeline, and launched a rocket that landed near the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.

Third, Iran followed up with defiant rhetoric. Mr. Trump warned, “If Iran wants to fight, that will be the end of Iran”—but eight days later he played down any chance of conflict, clarifying that “we’re not looking for regime change.” Tehran acted as if it had succeeded in calling the president’s bluff. “The Americans are unwilling and unable to carry out military action against us,” a military aide to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei asserted.

Deterrence requires Mr. Trump to maintain U.S. credibility. Otherwise, Iran will intensify its aggressive behavior and ratchet up its nuclear effort, making conflict likelier. Most immediately, the U.S. must retaliate with precise military action against critical Iranian assets. CONTINUE AT SITE