The Implications of Obama’s Failure in Egypt

Isi Leibler
August 29, 2013http://wordfromjerusalem.com/?p=4773

Isi & Naomi Leibler

wish you and your families a Shana Tova

– a year of good health, happiness and serenity.

May our prayers be answered and may our leaders be endowed with wisdom and integrity.

May we merit a year of peace and security for the State of Israel, good tidings for the Jewish people and may all good people throughout the world be blessed.

______________________

To date, US President Barack Obama’s efforts to appease or engage Islamists have either failed or backfired. US influence in the Mideast is at an all-time low and Islamic fundamentalism continues to gain strength at an alarming pace.

Egypt, which until a year ago was regarded by the US as an ally, is perhaps the most dramatic example of Obama’s complete failure to understand the nature of the region and the steps that must be taken to stabilize it. The current horrors and barbarism in Syria should not divert attention from events in Egypt, the outcome of which is likely to have a major impact on the entire region.

Obama’s first blunder in Egypt was the antagonism he displayed toward President Hosni Mubarak. Immediately following his first election, Obama insisted on inviting members of the outlawed Moslem Brotherhood to his Cairo address. As a result, Mubarak boycotted the event.

The Brotherhood Starts Anew in Syria

New leaders, new policies and new alliances for the recently reunited group

Raphaël Lefèvre

Returning to civil-war-stricken Syria from thirty years of exile, the Muslim Brotherhood is facing challenges on multiple fronts in its attempts to re-establish itself. But the establishment of its own charities, civil institutions and armed wings are helping the Brothers make their presence felt.

This Tuesday, March 5, 2013 citizen journalism file photo provided by Aleppo Media Center AMC shows Syrian man sitting on a fallen statue of former Syrian President Hafez Al-Assad in a central square in Raqqa, Syria. Hafez Al-Assad ordered the massacre of up to 30,000 citizens by the armed forces, in the face of an uprising by the Muslim Brotherhood. (AP Photo/Aleppo Media Center AMC, File)

While the Egyptian Brotherhood makes global headlines and Tunisia’s Ennahda Party struggles to remain in power, very little is publicly known about the state of Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood. In recent weeks, much has been made of the decrease in the group’s influence over the Syrian National Coalition (SNC). In contrast, not a lot has been said on the Brotherhood’s actual influence inside Syria and its strategy for the revolution. How exactly does the movement plan on dealing with recent trends in the conflict, such as the rise of Islamic extremism in opposition ranks?

Interview: Khaled Abu Toameh in Hadassah Magazine

Charley J. Levine

Photo by Albert Zablit.

 

Khaled Abu Toameh, 50, an award-winning Israeli journalist and documentary filmmaker, has reported on Arab affairs for three decades. He writes for The Jerusalem Post and the New York-based Gatestone Institute, a nonpartisan, not-for-profit international policy council and think tank, where he is a senior adviser. Since 1989, he also has been a producer and consultant for NBC News. He grew up in the Arab Israeli town of Baqa al-Gharbiyye near Haifa and studied at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He now lives in Jerusalem.

 

Q. What are the challenges of working as a journalist in the West Bank and Gaza?
A. Before the Oslo peace process began, Arab journalists had almost no problem traveling throughout the West Bank and Gaza, speaking freely with Palestinians. But ever since the Palestinian Authority came to the West Bank and Gaza, the situation has become much more challenging and dangerous. The P.A. expects you to serve as an official spokesperson and avoid criticism of its leaders.

 

With Hamas in power in Gaza, it’s become even more dangerous for independent Arab journalists. Because of the BDS [boycott, divestment and sanctions] movement against Israel, journalists representing the Israeli media, like myself, face not only difficulties but threats and even physical violence when we go to Ramallah. The P.A. leadership in the West Bank promotes BDS against Israel and also fights normalization with Israel. It bans meetings between Palestinians and Israelis and condemns the Israeli media as extremely hostile, which makes it impossible to work there and endangers our lives.

Where's the Coverage? Israel Surrounded by Threats

CAMERA

CAMERA has reported:

Recent statements by U.S. President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry portend a forceful American response to the Syrian government’s alleged use of chemical weapons.

Should the United States –and allies– strike Syria, both Iran and Syria have threatened to retaliate against Israel. This has received coverage in the popular press. The news media have also reported that Israel has had to call up reservists and deploy extra missile defenses, and even recounted:

In addition to [gas] masks, the Israeli government handed out small plastic tents designed to protect newborns and was running videos with step-by-step instructions on how to correctly don the gear.

What the media have missed are the multiple threats that Israel confronts beyond this immediate crisis. Israel literally faces peril on every border and Israelis are in danger from terrorists even when they travel abroad. This infographic from the Israeli embassy in Washington D.C. depicts some of the dangers:

PROFESSOR BERES AT HARVARD: Are Israel's Actions Legal?

A definitive legal analysis of Israel's actions against Syrian weapons transfer to Hezbollah under international law.

Prof. Louis René Beres

Louis René Beres (Ph.D., Princeton, 1971) is professor of Political Science and International Law at Purdue University. He is the author of many books, monographs, and articles dealing with Israeli security matters, nuclear strategy and nuclear war.

Published August 26, 2013 in the Harvard Law School National Security Journal, Harvard Law School, Harvard University.

Hezbollah, the Shiite terror organization based in Lebanon, has repeatedly sought to justify its armed pro-regime intervention in Syria. Most insistently, it has been arguing that Israel and the United States initially instigated the rebellion against Bashar al-Assad. To be sure, Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, is factually incorrect in this particular allegation. More importantly, however, the allegation is not jurisprudentially significant.

Because the Assad tyranny in Syria is responsible for substantially egregious and unpunished crimes against its own citizens—including, most recently, a series of reported chemical weapons attacks—any such rebellion could still be properly defended under international law. Here, the uprising would be described as a permissible expression of “humanitarian intervention,” or, as it is sometimes called in more currently fashionable legal language, “the responsibility to protect.”

Don't get too excited-let us see for how long this lasts

Palestinian schools switch to Israeli curriculum in Jerusalem
Maan news

Click to enlarge or see more photos of the classroom materials.

JERUSALEM (Ma'an) -- The director of education in Jerusalem has urged families with schoolchildren in Jerusalem to be aware that at least five Palestinian schools are switching to Israeli education materials.

Sameer Jibril said the Ebin Rushd and Abdulla bin Hussain schools were using Israeli education materials in the seventh and eighth grades. The Sour Baher school is using them for fourth, fifth and sixth grades, and the Ibin Khaldoun school uses it for seventh graders.

An education official told Ma’an that a meeting took place on Thursday in Herzliya near Tel Aviv for Palestinian and Israeli principals and teachers to discuss switching from Palestinian Authority to Israeli curricula.

"No Choice?"

Dear friends, I can do no more than write in response to the moment. The situation with regard to Syria is so fluid, that by the time you receive this, it may have shifted.  Accept my apologies in advance if that occurs.

 

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As to choice: More and more it's looking as if there are no alternative options for Obama with regard to whether the US hits Syria.  He is being squeezed into something that he might have otherwise passed on.

 

Certainly, the climate is heating up, and the media are talking about "when, and not if."  What is more, the leaders of Britain and France are ready to go and expecting him to participate with them.  From behind the scenes, the Gulf states, most notably Saudi Arabia, are encouraging this action because of their fear of Iran.

 

I read about Obama as the head of the coalition, and I laugh.  It is not altogether clear that he has even decided definitively; Defense Secretary Hagel keeps saying the military is ready for whatever the president decides.

 

The issues haven't changed for Obama.  He is obsessed with securing unassailable documentation, even beyond all that has been provided (including conversations among Syrian intelligence agents that were picked up by Israel), and in spite of what people speaking for the US have said about the certainty that the gas attack was Assad's doing.  Maybe he is looking for someone in the Syrian military who participated and has since defected?

Crisis: Egypt May Stop Warships Headed for Syria at Suez Canal

The current Egyptian leadership may close the Suez Canal to warships in an effort to block a western attack on Assad's Syria
By: Lori Lowenthal Marcus
The Jewish Press


Hassan Shahin, spokesperson for the Egyptian anti-Islamist Tamarod movement.
Photo Credit: Ahram

The leading anti-Muslim Brotherhood group in Egypt, the Tamarod (Rebellion), announced it will prevent military action threatened by the West against Syria, from using the Egyptian-controlled Suez Canal.

And the Suez Canal, of course, is the route through which U.S., British and other warships will need to pass for any non-air or land-based military strike against Syria.

SELF-SERVING POSTURING OVER SYRIA

by Melanie Phillips

The US, Britain and other western nations are about to make a bad mistake if they launch their threatened military strike at Syria.



Far from displaying Western strength, the strike reportedly being planned may instead disastrously confirm the enemies of the civilised world in their view that the US and UK are a busted flush, reduced merely to self-promoting posturing as a substitute for principled purpose and toughness of resolve.
For what is being proposed is no more than an empty gesture. It is that most vacuous, cynical and desperate of political knee-jerk reactions – the need to be seen to be ‘doing something’. Anything. As long as there is absolutely no cost to the political leaders urging such action. At least, no cost that can be unambiguously pinned on them.

Hotovely laments Likud 'schizophrenia' on two states

By LAHAV HARKOV

Existence of Jordan is a compromise, deputy minister says, speaking out against conceding land.

Deputy Transportation Minister Tzipi Hotovely talks tough. Photo: LAHAV HARKOV

 

The Likud's position on a two-state solution remained vague, as became readily apparent at a Wednesday night event for young party members featuring a debate between Deputy Transportation Minister Tzipi Hotovely and Likud activist and Jerusalem Institute for Justice Deputy Director-General Eli Hazan Wednesday evening.

"There's schizophrenia in our movement, with people pulling us this way and that," Hotovely said. "Political reporters love to write that we lack vision, and no party can allow itself that luxury."

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's party did not have a platform in the last election, and as such, does not have an official position on a two-state solution. Netanyahu says he favors the foundation of a demilitarized Palestinian State as part of a peace settlement, while many of the party's ministers and MKs have come out against such a move.

COP: 11,967 inconvenient facts

What do you get if you plot 11,967 tropical storm tracks over a map of the Earth?

NOAA did just that and what resulted is a nifty bit of historical documentation which illustrates quite nicely that hurricanes, cyclones and tropical storms occur naturally over time, and there is nothing unexpected about that.

In fact, 'the U.S. has experienced the fewest hurricanes during President Obama's time in office it has during any president's.  Perhaps Obama's promise that his election "was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow, and out planet began to heal" was not made entirely in vain after all.

o far, 2013 has seen historically low tropical storm activity in the North Atlantic, with none at all developing into hurricanes to date.  It has been eight years since a major hurricane hit the US, the longest such period since the Civil War.
The U.S. has experienced the fewest hurricanes during President Obama’s time in office it has of any president.  Perhaps Obama’s promise that his election “was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow, and our planet began to heal” was not made in vain after all.
- See more at: http://www.cfact.org/2013/08/28/history-shows-hurricanes-are-natural-hyping-them-is-not/#sthash.c4vrL4Qv.dpuf

COP: The mystery mound where Jesus walked on water?

Karin Kloosterman

Millions of Christian pilgrims visit Israel every year to walk in the footsteps of Jesus. They follow tour guides on Jerusalem’s Via Dolorosa, hike the Abraham and Jesus trails in the Galilee, and visit Nazareth, where Jesus gave sermons to his followers.

Now there may be a brand-new pilgrimage stop to witness where one of the biggest New Testament miracles took place: where Jesus walked on water.
To date, the exact location of this miracle out at “sea” is not known.
Israel’s newest archeological discovery, practically a stone’s throw from the baptismal site of Jesus on the River Jordan, may provide a clue, though nobody really knows yet what it is.

Israeli researchers led by Prof. Shmulik Marco from Tel Aviv University, who recently reported this discovery in the Journal of Nautical Archaeology, uncovered a third-century BCE mound of stones out in the Sea of Galilee (Lake Kinneret to Israelis).

Loose Lips on Syria

U.S. leaks tell Assad he can relax. The bombing will be brief and limited.  

WSJ

An American military attack on Syria could begin as early as Thursday and will involve three days of missile strikes, according to "senior U.S. officials" talking to NBC News. The Washington Post has the bombing at "no more than two days," though long-range bombers could "possibly" join the missiles. "Factors weighing into the timing of any action include a desire to get it done before the president leaves for Russia next week," reports CNN, citing a "senior administration official."
The New York Times, quoting a Pentagon official, adds that "the initial target list has fewer than 50 sites, including air bases where Syria's Russian-made attack helicopters are deployed." The Times adds that "like several other military officials contacted for this report, the official agreed to discuss planning options only on condition of anonymity."

Thus do the legal and moral requirements of secret military operations lose out in this Administration to the imperatives of in-the-know spin and political gestures.

Associated Press

Muslim Brotherhood's World Domination Blueprint

LT. COLONEL JAMES G. ZUMWALT, USMC (RET) August 28, 2013

Unappreciative of Western philosophy, members of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood probably never heard an analogy first mentioned by Roman statesman Cicero -- "putting the cart before the horse!" For more than two millennia, the phrase has applied to situations of misplaced priorities.

In the aftermath of the Egyptian military removing from office the country's fifth -- and first democratically elected -- president, Mohamed Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood is gaining an education about the phrase.

From its inception in 1928, the Muslim Brotherhood has been the subject of persecution due to its commitment to a single goal -- transitioning the world into an Islamic empire.

Recognizing Islamism begins at home, the Brotherhood plodded along for more than eight decades under four presidents seeking to achieve the goal in Egypt. Like a race horse heading home, the Muslim Brotherhood's pace quickened, sensing victory was near with Morsi's election.

The Muslim Brotherhood saw its gains as "one small step" for Islam and "one giant leap" for Muslimkind.

The global jihad-affiliated Abdullah Azzam Brigades claimed responsibility for firing rockets from south Lebanon into the western Galilee on August 22.

Issued on: 28/08/2013 Type: Article

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The Twitter account of the Salafist Lebanese sheikh Siraj al-Din Zariqat, a senior figure in the Abdullah Azzam Brigades in Lebanon.

Overview

1. On August 22, 2013, two barrages of two rockets each were fired into the western Galilee. Two landed in Israeli population centers, one in an open area and one was intercepted by the Iron Dome aerial defense system. There were no casualties but property damage was reported. It was the first incidence of rocket fire from south Lebanon in two years.

2. Responsibility for the attacks was attributed by sheikh Zariqat to the Abdullah Azzam Brigades, a global jihad organization with ties to Al-Qaeda, which has a branch in Lebanon (See Appendix A for information about the organization and its Lebanese branch). However, the Lebanese government condemned the rocket fire and the Lebanese foreign minister claimed that those who carried out were trying to drag Lebanon into a confrontation with Israel. Hezbollah did not issue a formal comment.

Western powers 'ready to go' for military strike against Syria

The objective: Punish and deter Assad and degrade Syria's weapons • Strike could come as early as Thursday • Syrian Army's elite 4th Division, commanded by Assad's brother, evacuates its Damascus base • Russia evacuates its citizens from Tartus.

Dan Lavie, Reuters and Israel Hayom Staff

A U.S. warplane lands on the USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf | Photo credit: AFP

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SHELL

The United States and its allies were gearing up on Wednesday for a probable military strike against Syria that could happen as early as Thursday. , as punishment for the Aug. 21 chemical weapons attacks blamed on President Bashar Assad's government.

The gathering military deployment was spurred by new intelligence that convinced U.S. President Barack Obama's top national security advisers that forces loyal to Assad had used chemical weapons and that they were actively trying to cover up evidence of it even while they shelled the site of the attack, officials told The Wall Street Journal.

The Palestinian Authority's "Israeli Affairs Committee"

Khaled Abu Toameh

What is really needed is a "Palestinian Affairs Committee" that would go to every mosque, school, university, village and refugee camp in the West Bank and Gaza to talk about peace and coexistence with Israel. To win the support of the Israeli public for peace, it should start by showing the Israelis that it is making every effort to convince Palestinians to support peace.

Instead of preparing Palestinians for peace with Israel, the Palestinian Authority leadership has decided to focus its efforts on winning the support of the Israeli public for a peaceful settlement based on the two-state solution.
In the context of its efforts to "convince" Israelis to accept the two-state solution, the Palestinian Authority recently established a special "Israeli Affairs Committee" with the goal of promoting the idea among the Israeli public.

The committee's main task, in fact, is to scare Israelis that failure to accept all Palestinian demands would plunge the region into another cycle of violence and bloodshed. The Palestinian Authority is hoping that to avoid another intifada, intimidated Israelis would put pressure on their government to comply with Palestinian demands.

Over the past few weeks, in a bid to "influence" public opinion in Israel, this committee organized a series of meetings between Palestinians and Israelis, Palestinian sources told the London-based Al-Hayat newspaper.

The Palestinian committee, formed by Mahmoud Abbas, includes top PLO and Fatah officials Yasser Abed Rabbo, Nabil Sha'ath, Jibril Rajoub, Hanan Ashrawi and Mohamed Madani.

"Why should any Israeli believe the Palestinian Authority when most Palestinians appear to be opposed to the resumption of the peace talks?" asks Khaled Abu Toameh. In this photo, U.S. Secretary of State Kerry, Israeli Justice Minister Livni, and Palestinian Chief Negotiator Erekat address reporters in Washington, D.C., on July 30, 2013. [State Department photo/ Public Domain]

Last week, the committee organized visits by Israeli parliamentarians to Ramallah, where they held talks with Abbas and other Palestinian officials to discuss prospects for peace in the Middle East.

One of the committee members explained, "Those we are meeting are the leaders of Israeli society and they will decide its fate. The Israeli public no longer knows what is happening here in the Palestinian territories."

Will Obama Really Hold Assad Accountable?

Benjamin Weinthal 

Jerusalem – Secretary of State John Kerry’s announcement that Bashar Assad’s use of chemical weapons against his population warrants action is long overdue. The Obama administration missed opportunity after opportunity during the 2011 nascent phase of the pro-reformist and democratic revolt against Assad.

Sadly, Obama’s inaction helped open the Jihadi flood gates and al-Qaeda forces filled pockets of anti-Assad resistance. The Obama administration’s inertia in Syria in 2011 resembled the failure to take sides with the Iranian people against the Mullahs’ regime in 2009.

Al Jazeera airs fake Brotherhood injuries and deaths

 Jihad Watch

While Al Jazeera’s pro-Islamist lies and propaganda have been exposed numerous times — lies and propaganda being doctrinally permissible through taqiyya — consider this video recently aired live by the terrorist supporting TV network. A near hysterical woman is heard lambasting the Egyptian military for supposedly killing peaceful Brotherhood protesters, while the Al Jazeera crew videotapes a man who appears to be either unconscious or dead — a supposed victim of the military. His hand rests on his torso; his shirt under his hand is covered with blood, implying there is a bullet wound in that spot.

Russia seizes the moment-good grief, stand down

Like a monkey with a grenade: Russia warns of "catastrophic consequences" if U.S. and U.K. hit Syria for al-Qaeda

Jihad Watch

This U.S. attack on Syria could turn out to be an Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo moment. "Russia warns of 'catastrophic consequences' if Syria hit," by Stuart Williams and Anna Smolchenko for AFP, August 27:

Russia on Tuesday warned a military intervention in Syria could have "catastrophic consequences" for the region and called on the international community to show "prudence" over the crisis. "Attempts to bypass the Security Council, once again to create artificial groundless excuses for a military intervention in the region are fraught with new suffering in Syria and catastrophic consequences for other countries of the Middle East and North Africa," a foreign ministry spokesman said.