"Islam to Topple Man-made Democracy"

Soeren Kern
May 31, 2012

http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/3087/sharia4holland

Leaders of the group say the purpose of Belgium's first Sharia Law court is to create a parallel legal system to challenge the state's authority as the enforcer of the civil law protections guaranteed by the Belgian constitution.

Police in Amsterdam have arrested the spokesperson of the Islamist group Sharia4Holland on charges of making death threats against the Dutch Freedom Party leader, Geert Wilders.
Abu Qasim was arrested after a speech he gave in Amsterdam's central Dam Square on May 25 (video in Dutch here), when he warned that Wilders would be "dealt with" once the Netherlands became an Islamic state.

Qasim also called Wilders "this dog of the Romans" and -- referring to the Dutch filmmaker and Islam critic who was murdered by a Dutch-Moroccan Muslim in 2004 -- warned that Wilders should learn lessons from "the case of Theo van Gogh."
Amsterdam's multiculturally-minded police initially refused to intervene in the case. Although making death threats is a criminal offense in Holland, police instead arrested a passer-by who tried to challenge the Sharia4Holland speaker.

Ryan Mauro

After New Jersey Attorney General Jeffrey S. Chiesa cleared the NYPD of misconduct in its intelligence-gathering efforts in N.J., he met with some Muslim leaders to discuss his findings. The full list of attendees hasn’t been publicized but there is one name that is known: Imam Mohammad Qatanani of the Islamic Center of Passaic County.

N.J. Governor Chris Christie (shown right) has been feeling heat from 

anti-Islamist activists ever since the Investigative Project on Terrorism published a startling report about his relationship with Imam Qatanani, who the Department of Homeland Security wants deported. In 1999, he failed to disclose on his green card application that he was convicted by Israel in 1993 of being a member of Hamas. He also admits to having been a member of the Muslim Brotherhood but says he left it in 1991—not because he turned against the group, but because he simply didn’t have enough time in the day anymore. The mosque that Qatanani currently leads, the Islamic Center of Passaic County (ICPC), was founded in 1989 by Hamas operative Mohammed el-Mezain, who has been sentenced to 15 years in prison for financing the terrorist group. El-Mezain also served as the ICPC’s imam and was the chairman of the Holy Land Foundation, a charity that was shut down for being a Hamas/Muslim Brotherhood front.

If Obama Doesn't Understand European History He Can't Get America's Future History Right

Barry Rubin

President Barack Obama’s mistaken reference to Nazi German death camps as “Polish death camps” is being ridiculed by critics as an example of incompetence. That misses the point.  The defense is that he was just reading his teleprompter. That misses the point, too.

After all, you don’t need to be a historical genius to have caught that error even if it was on the teleprompter. I am not suggesting that Obama doesn't know that the Nazi Germans operated the death camps though, to recall another gaffe of his, he might think that those among them hailing from the country whose capital had been Vienna spoke "Austrian."

Nevertheless, what this is really about is that Obama does not see himself as emerging from European history and, truth be told and despite his university degrees, doesn't know much about it. He has no idea, for example, about how the Poles and other Central European people or Europe itself think or what they have gone through. And frankly he doesn't care.

The Patriotism of Palestinianism

Sultan Knish

Each century brings forth its own patriots. Once upon a time we had Patrick Henry, today we have Senator Patrick Leahy, who declared in the Senate that his opposition to an amendment that would  distinguish how much of the UNRWA's funding goes to actual refugees versus fake refugees was a patriotic act.

"Refugee Camp"

"I always look at what is in the United States’ interest first and foremost, and this would hurt the United States’ interests,” Senator Leahy stated firmly. It is of course difficult to find as compelling a national interest as the UNRWA, a refugee agency created exclusively for the benefit of five million Arabs, approximately 30,000 of whom are actual refugees, but all of whom hate the United States.

Senator Leahy, who could not discover a national interest in the Balanced Budget Amendment, drilling for oil in ANWR or detaining Muslim terrorists, all of which he voted against; finally discovered a binding national interest 5,500 miles away in Jordan, where "refugee camps" like Baqa'a (pop. 80,000), which are virtually indistinguishable from local towns and cities, complete with block after block of residential homes, stores and markets, multi-story office buildings, schools, hospitals and assorted infrastructure, must not be looked at too closely.

As a city which will soon celebrate its 50 year anniversary, Baqa'a is older than many modern Israeli cities and is as much a refugee camp as any of them. The only difference between Baqa'a and Ariel, is that no one in Baqa'a does anything for themselves because they are all eternal refugees with an entire UN agency dedicated to wiping their bottoms for them. A unique and singular honor in a world full of authentic refugees who have been driven out by rape squads and genocide, without getting their own minders in blue.

US apology for ‘death camp’ remarks insufficient'

BENJAMIN WEINTHAL, JPOST CORRESPONDENT

05/31/2012 05:28

Embassy spokesman ‘surprised’ that US leader would misidentify Nazi camps as ‘Polish’ in speech honoring resistance fighter Jan Karski.

Photo: Yossi Zeilger

BERLIN – US President Barack Obama’s use of the term “Polish death camps” while awarding a posthumous Medal of Freedom to Polish-American resistance fighter Jan Karski sparked the Eastern European country’s prime minister to call for a more explicit apology and historical correction.

The White House expressed regret on Tuesday after Poland took offense at the term.

“Fluent in four languages, possessed of a photographic memory, Jan served as a courier for the Polish resistance during the darkest days of World War II,” the US president said in honoring Karski. “Before one trip across enemy lines, resistance fighters told him that Jews were being murdered on a massive scale, and smuggled him into the Warsaw Ghetto and a Polish death camp to see for himself. Jan took that information to president Franklin Roosevelt, giving one of the first accounts of the Holocaust and imploring to the world to take action.”
 US National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor stated that Obama “misspoke” by referring to “Polish death camps” rather than “Nazi death camps” inside occupied Poland.

Vietor’s statement came after Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski tweeted that Obama “will apologize for this outrageous error,” ascribing it to “ignorance and incompetence,” according to BuzzFeed.

Caliphate conference coming to Chicago area

Jihad Watch

Hizb ut-Tahrir is an international Islamic organization that openly calls for restoration of the caliphate -- that is, the political union of Muslims worldwide in a single Sharia state ruled by the caliph. This means that the group is dedicated to subverting and destroying all governments not ruled by Islamic law, and as such it is banned in many countries. But not in the U.S., which has never shown any awareness on an official level of non-violent efforts to impose Sharia. They're once again coming to the Chicago area to hold their Caliphate Conference: it will be held on June 17 in Rolling Meadows, Illinois.

In Memoriam of Shimon Erem

Nurit Greenger

Shimon Erem, a giant Jewish leader in Los Angeles and beyond, succumbed to cancer on Sunday, May 27^th, 2012, at the age of 90.

The "buzz" term is that 'they do not make then like Shimon anymore.' And indeed, Shimon was part of a generation that have not been duplicated, i.e. David Ben Gurion, Shmuel Katz, Golda Meir, Menachem Begin, Moshe Sharet, Yitzchak Shamir, et al. A generation of leaders who put their country, Israel, and the Jewish nation before their own life. Their dedication, devotion and commitment to defend and stand for the state of Israel had no boundareis.

So if they do not make them like Shimon Erem was, then either there is something wrong with the present generation or, we need not take this insult and show everyone that they do make them just like Shimon and his like today.

Now Obama Claims He Knows More About Judaism Than Any Other President, Ever

Daled Amos

We all know that the Obama administration is the one that has been the friendliest to Israel.

After all, Obama told us so.

Now we find out, via Daniel Halper that Obama is the most knowledgeable president about Judaism we've ever had:

"Rather than describe how deeply I care about Israel, I want to be blunt about how we got here," Obama said, reminding his guests that he had so many Jewish in Chicago at the beginning of his political career that he was accused of being a puppet of the Israel lobby.

In the Senate, he said, his support for Israel's qualitative military edge has been unwavering.

Obama added that people judged his support for Israel because of the differences between a center right government in Israel and center-left in the U.S. - because he pressed Netanyahu too hard in his belief that it's time to seize the moment and pursue peace initiative.

Obama also stressed he probably knows about Judaism more than any other president, because he read about it - and wondered how come no one asks Speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner or Senate minority leader Mitch McConnel about their support to Israel.

Let's take this a piece at a time.

You know that Obama is getting desperate when he has to resort to the old "some of my best friends are Jewish" refrain.

What have the Muslims ever done for us?

The Muqata

The Talmud tells us of a discussion between four rabbis in the mid-2nd century: Rabbi Yose ben Halafta, Rabbi Yehuda (bar Ilai), Rabbi Simeon bar Yochai (Rashbi) and Rabbi Yehuda ben Gerim.

Rabbi Yehuda praised the Romans: Look what good things they build - markets and bridges and bath-houses.  Rabbi Yose didn't take a stand, but Rashbi spoke up against the idea: everything they built, they built for their own use or to make money off us.

Rabbi Yehuda ben Gerim reported the conversation to the Roman authorities, and they in turn lauded Rabbi Yehuda and sentenced Rashbi to death.  Rashbi fled, and together with his son, hid in a cave for a dozen years.

In "Life of Brian", Monty Python spoofed this rabbinic discussion.  In this skit the Jewish rebel leaders discuss 'what have the Romans ever done for us?'

With this short Aggadah our rabbis showed us the different ways of looking at an occupying force.  But the Romans were not the only occupiers throughout our long history.  How did Jews view the Muslim occupiers?

Peter Beinart: Trojan Horse in the Temple

Rachel Neuwirth and John Landau

Peter Beinart, author of the recently published The Crisis of Zionism and editor of the Daily Beast’s “Open Zion” blog, has been criss-crossing the nation on a speaking tour for months, speaking at synagogues and to Jewish student groups on college campuses. He sometimes lectures alone, and sometimes engages in “debates” with individuals whose areas of disagreement with him are limited.

American Jews are not alone in laying out the welcome mat for Beinart. Within the past week, the Jerusalem Post published an editorial welcoming Beinart into the “big tent” of “Zionism,” and commending his call for a boycott of Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria as “well-intentioned” and somehow different from similar calls by foreign governments. In an unprecedented move, the Jerusalem Post’s weekly columnist Isi Leibler was compelled to condemn his own newspaper’s editorial as “idiotic.”

Why are we Jews laying out the red carpet to this man? And why, in general, are we Jews so friendly and deferential to our worst enemies?

One reason is that, despite the efforts of our enemies through the ages to portray us as super-sophisticated criminal masterminds, we Jews are actually very simple-minded and naive, at least where our enemies are concerned.

Beinart professes at every opportunity to love Israel and to even be a “Zionist.” He boasts that he even has an Israeli flag displayed on the wall of his six-year-old son’s room. This seems to render his Jewish audiences oblivious to Beinart’s repetition and endorsement of nearly every element of the Arab world’s anti-Israel narrative and his overwhelmingly negative characterization of Israel as an “undemocratic” society.

Not that Beinart isn’t also a clever debater. His principal tactic is to make so many false or misleading statements all at once that it is impossible to reply to or even to keep track of them all. Inevitably, some of them will sink subliminally into the minds of his audience, if they are the least bit open to suggestion. Also in his arsenal of debating tactics are distortions by omission and false assumptions implied by his tone and the drift of his argument. These methods are especially insidious since they do not require the “lie direct” and make it difficult for the audience to examine the implied assumptions on which they are based.

Palestinians may boycott UNICEF over business with Israel

KHALED ABU TOAMEH, TOVAH LAZAROFF

05/31/2012 

Palestinian Contractors Union denounce United Nations Children’s Fund for accepting offers from Israeli firms to bid for construction work in Gaza; UNICEF says no contracts have been awarded to any firms.

Photo: REUTERS

The Palestinians are threatening to boycott the United Nations Children’s Fund after the agency decided to accept offers from Israeli firms to bid for construction work in the Gaza Strip.
The Palestinian Contractors Union denounced UNICEF and warned Palestinians against cooperating with Israeli firms.

The head of the union, Osama Kahil, said he received complaints from Palestinian contractors who told him that Israeli firms had asked for their cooperation in carrying out construction work in the Gaza Strip, offering them half of the revenues.

Sitting Out Obama

Victor Davis Hanson, NRO

 We recently saw lots of sit-down strikes and demonstrations — the various efforts in Wisconsin, the Occupy movements, and student efforts to oppose tuition hikes. None of them mattered much or changed anything. There is a sit-down strike, however, that has paralyzed the country and has been largely ignored by the media.

Most economists since 2009 have been completely wrong in their forecasts, reminding us that their supposedly data-driven discipline is more an art than a science. After all, a great deal of money is invested and spent — or not — based largely on perceptions, hunches, and emotions rather than a 100 percent certainty of profit or loss. And the message Americans are getting is that the Obama administration is hostile to investment and business, and thus should be waited out.

Barack Obama’s original economic team — Austan Goolsbee, Christina Romer, Larry Summers, Peter Orszag — have long fled the administration, and have proved mostly wrong in all their therapies and prognostications of 2009. Despite the stimulus of borrowing over $5 trillion in less than four years, near-zero interest rates, and chronic deficits, the U.S. economy is in the weakest recovery since the Great Depression and mired in the longest streak of continuous unemployment of 8 percent or higher — 38 months — since the 1930s. The Mexican economy is growing more rapidly than is ours. Why did not massive annual $1 trillion–plus deficits spark a recovery, as government claimed an ever larger percentage of GDP, and new public-works projects were heralded by the administration?
 
Much of the answer is found in the collective psyche of those Americans who traditionally hire, purchase, or invest capital. An economy is simply the aggregate of millions of private agendas, of people sensing and reacting to a commonly perceived landscape. Yet since January 2009, that landscape has been bleak and foreboding.

Take the debt. The problem is not just that Obama has borrowed $5 trillion in less than four years, but also that he has offered few plans to reduce the ongoing borrowing and none at all to pay down the debt. Instead, he has demonized as heartless anyone who opposes his serial $1 trillion annual deficits. That demoralizes the public, who privately know that they cannot buy everything they might wish, and who expect that government will not, either. In the business community, there is the unspoken assumption that, at some point very soon, either taxes will have to rise, the currency will have to inflate radically, or debts will have to be renounced — all equally foreboding for those with capital. Some even believe that Obama is not a haphazardly profligate spender but a deliberate one who welcomes the radical measures on the horizon to stave off bankruptcy as laudable in themselves.

Take energy. We are reminded that the ANWR field in Alaska — and others far greater there — are still off limits. So too are over 25 million barrels off the California coast. Federal leases have been vastly curtailed in the Gulf of Mexico, off the Eastern Seaboard, and in the American West. The cancellation of the Keystone pipeline, which would have kept billions of U.S. petrodollars inside North America, coupled with Solyndra-like federally subsidized solar and wind boondoggles, sent the message that the government would oppose energy that was profitable and subsidize sources that were not.

Worse still, in less than four years, we have now an entire corpus of Obama-administration quotations blasting fossil-fuel energy. The president himself promised skyrocketed energy prices with his now-stalled cap-and-trade proposals. He mused that new regulations might bankrupt coal-burning companies. He ridiculed the idea of increasing oil and gas supplies by more drilling and instead pointed to the importance of proper tire pressure and regular tune-ups and spoke of tapping America’s vast algae resources. Secretary of Energy–designate Steven Chu mused that he wanted gas to reach European price levels, apparently in hopes of curbing fossil-fuel consumption while making alternative sources of energy more competitive. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, who as a senator had claimed that even $10-a-gallon gas would not prompt him to open up federal lands for oil and gas leases, shrugged that there is no way of knowing whether $9-a-gallon gas is on the horizon. More recently, it was disclosed that an EPA regional administrator, Al Armendariz, had bragged of trying to “crucify” and “make examples” of gas and oil companies in the manner that the Romans did to conquered peoples.

The current renaissance in American oil and gas production is primarily a private effort to drill on private land, despite rather than because of the Obama administration. That the Obama administration takes credit for private companies’ finding new sources of low-priced oil and gas, despite government hopes that they would fail, only heightens the sense of private-sector cynicism and pessimism. The result is that “speculators” do not believe the oil companies will be given access to enormous energy reserves on public lands — and that, to the degree they drill new wells on private lands, a horde of apparatchiks from academia such as Mr. Armendariz will make life difficult for them.

Take also new mandates. The problem with Obamacare is not just that it represents a vast new entitlement at a time of record annual deficits, but that no one knows how much it will cost employers to enroll their employees. Potential hirers instead suspect only that their health-care expenses will spike, and those who are politically connected for that very reason have sought and obtained exemptions from the Obama administration: All companies, liberally owned or not, want out, not in — exactly the opposite of what the administration forecast. The public likewise suspects that Obamacare will come to resemble the hated TSA they see at airports — lots of employees milling around, little guarantee that the job at hand is done well, and an evident resentment of federal employees toward the public they serve. Will X-rays for our kidneys resemble the sort of scanning process and pat-downs we endure at airports? And the more the government seems to take over private enterprise — the car bailouts, the mortgage industry, student loans, wind and solar partnerships — the more private enterprise is frightened of being the next small guitar company or the next Chrysler creditor. Government seems now to be not only incompetent but arrogant, as if its vast recent growth ensured its impunity from oversight — whether in the GSA scandal, the Secret Service debacle, or the Fast and Furious mess.

Take wealth. There is a crass war against wealth. Obama has ridiculed those who have done well as the one-percenters, the fat cats, the corporate-jet owners, and the ones who don’t pay their fair share or don’t know when to stop making money. But the problem with this boilerplate populism is that it does not emanate from the muscular classes and is not aimed uniformly at the proverbial rich. The first family vacations in Martha’s Vineyard, Costa del Sol, Vail, and Aspen, not at Camp David; and the lieutenants in this class warfare are themselves one-percenters, an Al Gore, John Kerry, or Nancy Pelosi. Likewise, who determines whether to go after the Koch brothers or Warren Buffett; is this week’s enemy to be Exxon or Google? Why is the non-income-tax-paying GE under Jeffrey Immelt apparently approved, while a CEO on Wall Street is deemed a fat cat? Is it give to Obama and you are canonized; give to Romney and your name is posted on an enemies-list, pro-Obama website?

The only thing more discouraging to investors than class warfare generally is a certain type of class warfare: a hypocritical crusade that emanates from the upper classes and selectively targets enemies on the basis not of wealth, but of the degree to which they have failed to buy exemptions with their wealth. Meanwhile, on the other end, the message is more weeks of unemployment insurance, vastly more food-stamp recipients, and constant promises of mortgage-debt relief, credit-card-debt relief, and tuition-debt relief. If one were to dream up a perfect way to destroy incentives on both the top and bottom ends, one could do no better than what we have seen since 2009.

The net result is that those with capital, even if they are small businesses, do not believe that the Obama administration likes them. They feel that regulations will increase, that taxes will increase, that energy costs will increase, and that as they pay more to government and keep less, government will nevertheless become even more arrogant and inefficient — and they will become even more demonized. When people pay over 50 percent in payroll, federal, state, and local taxes and are still caricatured as “not paying their fair share,” a sort of collective shrug follows and bodes ill for the economy at large. One need not be liked to make money, but the constant presidential harangues finally take their toll in insidious ways.

Countless times each day, a contractor chooses to hire only a part-time electrician, a CEO hoards cash rather than opens a new plant, a renting family declines to buy a reasonably priced new house, an indebted graduate heads home to kick back and wait until “something turns up,” and an unemployed worker wonders whether it is not wiser to receive all two years of federal benefits before reentering the work force.

I don’t know whether Mitt Romney’s economic package will bring instant prosperity. But I suspect that the fact alone that it is not what we have seen and heard for the last four years will unleash a pent-up energy of the sort we have not seen in a long time. In short, President Obama has achieved the impossible — he has convinced millions of rational, profit-minded Americans eager to invest, buy, and hire that he doesn’t worry much whether they do.

— Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and the author most recently of The End of Sparta. You can reach him by e-mailing author@victorhanson.com.

World Leaders Ignore International Law

Jewish Settlements in Judea and Samaria are Perfectly Legal and Legitimate

May 30, 2012 | Eli. E. Hertz

[Update]
The U.S. Administration, the European Union, the United Nations, and Russia's decision to rewrite history by labeling the Territories 'Occupied Territories,' the Settlements as an 'Obstacle to Peace' and 'Not Legitimate,' thus endowing them with an aura of bogus statehood and a false history. The use of these dishonest loaded terms, empowers terrorism and incites Palestinian Arabs with the right to use all measures to expel Israel.

The Jewish People's Right to the Land of Israel

The "Mandate for Palestine" & the Law of War

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, United States President Barack Obama, and the European Union Foreign Affairs Chief Catherine Ashton became victims to the 'Occupation' mantra their own organization has repeated over and over in their propaganda campaign to legitimize the Arab position.

Continuous pressure by the "Quartet" (U.S., the European Union, the UN and Russia) to surrender parts of the Land of Israel are contrary to international law as stated in the "Mandate for Palestine" document, that in article 6 firmly call to "encourage ... close settlement by Jews on the land, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes." It also requires, under Article 5 of the Mandate to "seeing that no Palestine territory shall be ceded or leased to, or in any way placed under the control of the government of any foreign power."

Any attempt by the World Leaders to negate the Jewish people's right to Palestine - Eretz-Israel, and to deny them access and control in the area designated for the Jewish people by the League of Nations, is a serious infringement of international law, and as such - illegitimate.

FYI: Backing the Brotherhood

Amani Maged interviews Mohamed Mursi, the Muslim Brotherhood candidate in the forthcoming presidential elections and assesses his chances of succes.

Al-Ahram Weekly 10 - 16 May 2012

Mohamed Mursi is the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) candidate in the upcoming presidential elections. Born in 1951 in the Sharqiya governorate, Mursi graduated with honours from the Faculty of Engineering at Cairo University and then went to the US for graduate studies, obtaining a doctorate in engineering from the University of Southern California in 1982.

From there, he worked as an assistant professor at California State University in North Ridge. In 1985, he returned to Egypt, where he became professor and head of the materials engineering department at the Faculty of Engineering at Zagazig University. He continued in this post until 2010, during which time he also worked for a period at the Faculty of Engineering at Cairo University.

Mursi's relationship with the political bureau of the Muslim Brotherhood began when it was founded in 1992. He ran for parliament in 1995 and 2000, being elected an MP in the latter elections and becoming spokesman for the Brotherhood's parliamentary bloc. On 30 April 2011, he was elected chair of the Brotherhood's recently founded political wing, the Freedom and Justice Party.

 In an interview with Al-Ahram Weekly, Mursi explained his political ideas and programme.

Iran’s Offensive in America’s Backyard

Clare M. Lopez
Radicalislam.org
http://lopez.pundicity.com/11772/iran-latin-america

While much attention lately has rightly been focused on Iran’s nuclear weapons program, the mullahs have also been busy elsewhere—especially in America’s own backyard. During Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s two-term presidency, Iran has expanded its activity in the Western Hemisphere to an alarming degree.


Tehran has found hospitable terrain among some of Latin America’s most anti-American regimes, including in Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Venezuela. The jihadist regime’s hundreds of commercial, diplomatic and security ventures across the region not only help it break out of isolation, evade U.S. and international sanctions and forge relationships that provide access to needed resources, but also gain a foothold for Iranian intelligence, military and terrorist operations within striking distance of the American homeland.

Since Ahmadinejad took over the Iranian presidency in 2005, his administration has expanded Iran’s diplomatic facilities in Latin America from five to 11 and set up 17 “cultural centers.” Every one of these provides cover slots for operatives of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), Quds Force and intelligence service (MOIS – Ministry of Intelligence and Security).

Their job is to manage relationships with narcotrafficking, organized crime and terrorist organizations. Riding the vector of a bourgeoning Lebanese Shi’ite immigrant population in South America dating to the 1970’s, Hizballah has made the region a focus of its attack plotting, fundraising, money laundering, proselytizing, recruitment and terror training activities.

Evidence also is mounting that Hizballah cells, with members in the hundreds, increasingly are working in cooperation with Mexican drug cartels, sharing terrorist expertise with them, and moving northward, across the border and up into the U.S. and Canada.

Is this the result you expected from the "Arab Spring?"

Christians Should "Convert, Pay Tribute, or Leave," Says Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood Candidate?

Raymond Ibrahim  •  May 30, 2012 

"They need to know that conquest is coming, that Egypt will be Islamic, and that they must pay jizya or emigrate," Morsi reportedly said.

According to the popular Egyptian website, El Bashayer, Muhammad Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood presidential candidate, just declared that he will "achieve the Islamic conquest (fath) of Egypt for the second time, and make all Christians convert to Islam, or else pay the jizya," the additional Islamic tax, or financial tribute, required of non-Muslims, or financial tribute.

In a brief report written by Samuel al-Ashay and published by El Bashayer on May 27, Morsi allegedly made these comments while speaking with a journalist at the headquarters of the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party, adding "We will not allow Ahmed Shafiq [his contending presidential candidate] or anyone else to impede our second Islamic conquest of Egypt."

After his interviewer pointed out that the first Muslim conquest of Egypt was "carried out at the hands of Amr bin al-As [in 641]," he asked Morsi, "Who will the second Islamic conqueror be?" Morsi, replied, "The second Muslim conqueror will be Muhammad Morsi," referring to himself, "and history will record it."

Muslim Brotherhood Plotting To Take Over Jordan?

Khaled Abu Toameh  •  May 30, 2012 

What is clear by now is that no matter how much the king does to fight corruption and implement reforms, the Muslim Brotherhood will continue to argue that it is not enough. Many Arabs feel that President Obama's endorsement of the Muslim Brotherhood has emboldened the Islamists and increased their desire to drive moderate and secular rulers out of the Middle East. Unless the US administration stops flirting with the Muslim Brotherhood, Jordan will be turned into an Islamic republic.

Jordanian government officials say there are growing signs that the kingdom's powerful Muslim Brotherhood organization has plans to overthrow the regime.

The organization, according to the officials, has succeeded in hijacking the anti-corruption and pro-democracy protests that have swept Jordan over the past year.

Today, most of the anti-regime demonstrations throughout the kingdom are being initiated and led by Muslim Brotherhood supporters whose goal is to turn Jordan into an Islamic republic.

Many Arabs feel that President Barack Obama's endorsement of the Muslim Brotherhood has emboldened the Islamists and increased their appetite to drive moderate and secular rulers out of the Arab world.

How Tehran Is Outflanking Washington

Michael Singh

New York Daily News
May 30, 2012

Last week's talks in Baghdad between Iran and the P5-plus-1 -- the United States, Britain, China, France, Germany and Russia -- yielded no agreement. Paradoxically, however, both Washington and Tehran are likely to view the negotiations as successful, but for vastly different reasons.

There is an interest that both Iran and the United States hold in common: staving off military action, whether by the U.S. or Israel. From there, however, U.S. and Iranian motivations diverge; understanding this divergence is key to understanding why the talks thus far have failed.

Iranian officials publicly dismiss but likely privately worry about the consequences of war, while U.S. officials often seem more worried about the consequences of military action than about the Iranian nuclear program a strike would be designed to destroy.

Indeed, for many within the United States and other P5-plus-1 countries, the mere fact of "intensive" talks about Iran's nuclear program is itself a success. There is a narrative, espoused by then-candidate Barack Obama during the 2008 presidential campaign, that at the root of the Iran nuclear crisis is U.S.-Iran conflict, and that the root cause of that conflict is mistrust.

"Hiatus"

Arlene Kushner

Every so often a project comes along that demands my full time and attention, so that for a period of some days I am unable to devote myself to posting.

 

I am about to become involved with such a project and simply wanted my readers to know that there will be several days during which I will not be doing my postings, which (while I love writing them) are considerably time-consuming.  Nothing is wrong.  I am fine, as, thank G-d, is my family. 

Nocturne in Black and White

Sultan Knish

The respected black commentator and philosopher Thomas Sowell has described the growing toll of black-on-white violence as a race war. I would take issue with that only because "war" implies a level of organization that supersedes that of the flash mobs.

Most of the riot organizers have moved on to cozier job titles, like Al Sharpton, who has gone from organizing riots and boycotts to holding down a desk at MSNBC and serving as the unofficial White House liaison to the black community. The old riots were usually a combination of organized protest and opportunistic violence. The organized riot is on the decline, but the opportunistic violence is still very much with us.

Zionism Now More Than Ever

Nurit Greenger

The journalist Melanie Phillips just wrote a extraordinarily good article she named 'Zionism and bigotry' (http://phillipsblog.dailymail.co.uk/2012/05/zionism-and-bigotry.html).  In the article she wrote, "Judaism is like a stool supported on three legs – the nation, the religion and the land," and "Zionism is no more, nor less, than the self-determination of the Jewish people - as a people, and not just as adherents of the Jewish religion. Jews are in fact the only people – as a people – for whom Israel, ancient Judea and Samaria, was ever their national homeland. Those who deny Zionism, thus deny Jewish peoplehood and the fundamental right of Jews to live as a people in their own ancestral homeland, Israel."

There is only one state on earth that has the legal and moral right to protect all Jews and it is Israel. However, way too many Jews, in Israel and all over the world, are behaving as if this profound right and obligation has no meaning, and thus they are constantly attempting to sabotage it.

Israel Fosters Peace and Democracy in Mideast

The following is an example of pro-Israel letter support-enjoy the read.

Dear Editor,

In his recent letter to the Guardian, Nikolai Smith suggests that Israel is a “systemic threat to peace and democracy in the region.” The reality is that Israel is, in fact, the region’s only bright spot for peace and democracy. Several respected non-governmental organizations (NGOs) produce annual reports which rank the human rights, both civil and political, that each country provides its citizens and all of these NGOs give Israel the highest marks, by far, among the 22 countries of the Middle East including the territories governed by the Palestinian Authorities such as Gaza, which is ruled by Hamas and areas within the West Bank, where the Palestinian Authority governs. The annual report of the most respected of these NGOs, Freedom House International, consistently designates only one Mideast country as providing its citizens full freedom. That country is Israel. Similarly, other NGOs such as Democracy Ranking, Carleton University’s Country Indicators for Foreign Policy, World Democracy Audit and others all put Israel far ahead of all her Muslim neighbors in all categories including gender equality, freedom of press, religious freedom, access to justice, political freedom, etc.

Israel breaks silence on Iranian nuclear talks

Vice PM Ya'alon says negotiations with world powers in Baghdad only produced 'more Iranian time-buying'

Reuters

Published:   Israel News

International nuclear talks with Iran have achieved nothing, a senior Israeli official said on Tuesday, suggesting that some Western nations were happy to see the negotiations drag on.
Israel, which has threatened to go to war to prevent its arch-foe going nuclear, has fretted on the sidelines as six world powers press for a curb on Iranian uranium enrichment.


Breaking Israel's official silence on the second round of talks, held in Baghdad last week, Vice Prime Minister Moshe Ya'alon said they had only produced "more Iranian time-buying."

"(There was) no significant achievement except for the Iranians having been given another three weeks or so to pursue the nuclear project until the next meeting in Moscow," he told Army Radio in an interview.
"To my regret, I don't see any sense of urgency, and perhaps it is even in the interest of some players in the West to stretch out the time, which would certainly square with the Iranian interest."



The Baghdad talks on Iran's nuclear program. (Photo: Reuters)

Ya'alon, a member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party, would not elaborate. In January, he accused US President Barack Obama of diluting anti-Iran sanctions for fear of a spike in fuel prices that would sap his bid to win another White House term in November.

Civil disobedience

  By ARIEH ELDAD

The minority would have the right to oppose the decision, and even more so if the leader was corrupt.

Photo: Paul Hanna / Reuters Jean-Jacques

Rousseau, the 18-century thinker whose ideas form the basis of modern democracy, warned in On the Social Contract of the danger that a majority might sometimes favor its own interests rather than the common good. Rousseau said that in such a case, the majority’s decision would be unjust.

The majority’s decision may be reached in accordance with proper procedure.

A strong leader may force his opinion on the majority and win its approval. Nonetheless, the minority would have the right to oppose the decision, and even more so were leader corrupt or the decision reached by open bribery or the dismissal of, or threats against, those who opposed him.

Under such circumstances, or were a ruler to adopt policies opposite those he promised during elections, refusing to even explain his new policy though it would affect the lives of thousands, and refusing to submit it to a referendum – the minority would have no recourse but civil disobedience.

Kansas gov. signs measure blocking Islamic law

FOX News

Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback has signed a law aimed at keeping the state's courts or government agencies from basing decisions on Islamic or other foreign legal codes, and a national Muslim group's spokesman said Friday that a court challenge is likely.

The new law, taking effect July 1, doesn't specifically mention Shariah law, which broadly refers to codes within the Islamic legal system. Instead, it says courts, administrative agencies or state tribunals can't base rulings on any foreign law or legal system that would not grant the parties the same rights guaranteed by state and U.S. constitutions.

"This bill should provide protection for Kansas citizens from the application of foreign laws," said Stephen Gele, spokesman for the American Public Policy Alliance, a Michigan group promoting model legislation similar to the new Kansas law. "The bill does not read, in any way, to be discriminatory against any religion."

But supporters have worried specifically about Shariah law being applied in Kansas court cases, and the alliance says on its website that it wants to protect Americans' freedoms from "infiltration" by foreign laws and legal doctrines, "especially Islamic Shariah Law."

Count Palestine Refugees?

Daniel Pipes
National Review Onlinehttp://www.meforum.org/pipes/11359/palestine-refugees

The fetid, dark heart of the Arab war on Israel, I have long argued, lies not in disputes over Jerusalem, checkpoints, or "settlements." Rather, it concerns the so-called Palestine
refugees.

So called because of the nearly 5 million official refugees served by UNRWA (short for the "United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East"), only about 1 percent are real refugees who fit the agency's definition of "people whose normal place of residence was Palestine between June 1946 and May 1948, who lost both their homes and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict." The other 99 percent are descendants of those refugees, or what I call fake refugees.

Perversely, UNRWA feted its 60th anniversary in 2009, as though this were something to be proud of.

Worse: those alive in 1948 are dying off and in about fifty years not a single real refugee will remain alive, whereas (extrapolating from an authoritative estimate in Refugee Survey Quarterly by Mike Dumper) their fake refugee descendants will number about 20 million. Unchecked, that population will grow like Topsy until the end of time.

How Can Obama's Middle East Policy Possibly Get Worse? Answer: Look at Syria

Some of my readers are unhappy that I keep criticizing President Barak Obama and his government.  The problem, however, is that this administration keeps doing terrible things in the Middle East.  And the most damning evidence on these actions comes not from Obama’s enemies but from the administration itself and the supportive mass media.

Here’s the latest such item:

“U.S. Hopes Assad Can Be Eased Out with Russia's Aid,” by Helene Cooper and Mark Landler, in the New York Times.

For almost three years, Obama insisted he would win over the Syrian dictatorship and make it America’s friend rather than Iran’s number-one ally. That was ludicrous. Forced by the uprising to back away from Damascus, the Obama Administration has spent almost a year bumbling about what to do.

The U.S. government’s main activity was to entrust to the Turkish Islamist regime the job of forming an umbrella Syrian opposition leadership. Not surprisingly, Ankara pursued its own interest by assembling a Muslim Brotherhood-dominated group, the Syrian National Congress. Though several members resigned, complaining of the radical Islamist control, the Obama Administration is still trying to force hostile oppositionists to join.

Now a new and equally terrible policy is unveiled. I’ll let the New York Times’ reporters explain it:

“President Obama will push for the departure of President Bashar al-Assad under a plan that calls for a negotiated political settlement that would satisfy Syrian opposition groups but that could leave remnants of Assad's government in place. The success of the plan hinges on Russia, one of Assad's staunchest allies, which has strongly opposed his removal. Obama, administration officials said, will press the proposal with President Putin of Russia at their meeting next month. Obama's national security adviser raised the plan with Putin in Moscow three weeks ago.”

Good grief! There are four different acts of strategic insanity involved in this paragraph. They are:

--“A negotiated political settlement that…could leave remnants of Assad’s government in place.”

The Syrian dictatorship is led by murderous thugs who know this is a case of kill or be killed. They aren't going to give up any of their power. And why should they since they think they're winning and may well be right. They know the outside world won’t do anything, despite the regime having killed around 10,000 civilians.

--“A negotiated political settlement that would satisfy Syrian opposition groups but that could leave remnants of Assad's government in place.”

The opposition is not so foolish as a Washington pundit, policymaker, or politician. They know that their only hope is to destroy the regime entirely. The democrats want to do so in order to have a modern democracy. The Islamists want Islamism. The Kurds and Druze want autonomy. How could there possibly be a coalition? Both sides know that within days people would be murdering each other. How could anyone expect this kind of deal would work or that the opposition would accept it?

If anyone in Syria might favor such a plan it's the Muslim Brotherhood. which has toyed with the idea of using such a transition period to strengthen its own hand. So the idea cannot succeed but reveals once again that the Obama Administration seems to get many of its strategies from the Muslim Brotherhood. That’s an observation, not a conspiracy theory.

-- “The success of the plan hinges on Russia, one of Assad's staunchest allies, which has strongly opposed his removal.”

Just think about that sentence! The Obama Administration wants to depend on a country that's disdainful of U.S. interests, wants to sabotage them, and is on the opposite side! The president wants to ask a country that is “strongly opposed” Assad’s removal to remove Assad!

And finally, equally amazingly:

“Obama, administration officials said, will press the proposal with President Putin of Russia at their meeting next month. Obama's national security adviser raised the plan with Putin in Moscow three weeks ago.”

It's Obama, not Russian leader Vladimir Putin, who is pushing this plan to put Russia in control! If your enemy tries to fool or cheat you, that’s a problem. If you beg him and hand him the means to do so, that’s a betrayal of U.S. interests.

To summarize, the Obama policy shows three characteristics that have wider implications for the president’s strategies. It favors Islamist enemies; it “leads from behind” by giving the initiative to those who wish America no good; and it shows no interest in helping genuinely pro-American moderates who are fighting for their lives.

And that, friends, is why I spend so much time bashing Obama’s Middle East policy, because it is so very bad and dangerous.

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Barry Rubin, Israel: An Introduction (Yale University Press) is the first comprehensive book providing a well-rounded introduction to Israel, a definitive account of the nation's past, its often controversial present, and much more. It presents a clear and detailed view of the country’s land, people, history, society, politics, economics, and culture. This book is written for general readers and students who may have little knowledge but even well-informed readers tell us they’ve learned new things.Please click here to purchase your copy and get more information on the book. http://www.gloria-center.org/israel-an-introduction/

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Now a possible explanation for all of this would be that Obama doesn’t really want to do anything about Syria for other reasons. The United States doesn’t want to get dragged into direct intervention; it’s a lower-priority issue; there’s no great policy option; and his only concern is the American election.

But so what? It's still possible to come up with a better policy than this, a policy that would make Obama look good as well as serve U.S. interests. He could call for Assad’s overthrow; back truly moderate oppositionists; subvert Islamist influence; and send arms and money, but only to the moderates. In order to portray himself as decisive, heroic, and a friend of democracy, Obama could take every possible overt and covert opportunity to weaken Assad, even helping at a low cost to create a no-fly zone and safe havens. None of this is going to happen.

Instead, though, he turns over dealing with the opposition to an Islamist regime in Turkey and subcontracts dealing with the regime to a pro-regime Russian government. I’d say that Obama’s policy in the region could not easily be worse but who knows what’s next, especially if there's a second term?

Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His book, Israel: An Introduction, has just been published by Yale University Press. Other recent books include The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). The website of the GLORIA Center  and of his blog, Rubin Reports. His original articles are published at PJMedia.

Professor Barry Rubin, Director, Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center http://www.gloria-center.org
The Rubin Report blog http://rubinreports.blogspot.com/
He is a featured columnist at PJM http://pajamasmedia.com/barryrubin/. 
Editor, Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal http://www.gloria-center.org

Editor Turkish Studies,http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~db=all~content=t713636933%22

Reports of the Muslim Brotherhood's Demise Were Greatly Exaggerated

Eric Trager

New Republic


In the run-up to the first round of Egypt's presidential elections, which concluded on Thursday, the Muslim Brotherhood's downfall was widely anticipated. Only four months after winning a 47-percent plurality in the parliamentary elections, the Washington Post reported that the Brotherhood's stock was "plunging," while the Wall Street Journal insisted that the Brotherhood's fortunes had "faded" due to "mounting public criticism" and "internal defections." Pre-elections polls bolstered this storyline, pegging support for notoriously uncharismatic Brotherhood nominee Mohamed Morsi at a paltry three to nine percent, and it was widely expected that many Muslim Brothers would buck their parent organization and support ex-Brotherhood leader Abdel Monem Abouel Fotouh.

Yet reports of the Muslim Brotherhood's demise, it seems, were greatly exaggerated: Morsi won a first-round plurality with roughly 26 percent of the vote, and will face former Mubarak regime figure Ahmed Shafik in the second round, which begins on June 16. Morsi's strong performance, which comes despite his many deficiencies as a candidate, is a testament to the Muslim Brotherhood's unmatched mobilizing capabilities, which have made the organization's political dominance practically inevitable since the moment that Hosni Mubarak resigned.

It is not merely that the Muslim Brotherhood is Egypt's "best organized" group, as many commentators frequently note. It is the only organized group, with a nationwide hierarchy that can quickly transmit commands from its Cairo-based Guidance Office (maktab al-irshad) to its 600,000 members scattered throughout Egypt. The hierarchy works as follows: The twenty-member Guidance Office sends its marching orders to deputies in each governorate (muhafaza), who communicate with their deputies in each "sector" (quita), who communicate with their deputies in each "area" (muhafaza), who communicate with their deputies in each "populace" (shoaba), who finally communicate with the leaders of each Brotherhood "family" (usra), which is comprised of five Muslim Brothers and represents the organization's most basic unit. This chain of command is used for executing all Guidance Office decisions, including commanding Muslim Brothers to participate in protests, organize social services, and -- during the most recent elections -- campaign and vote for Mohamed Morsi.

Obama Neuters War on Islamic Terrorists

Dr. Sebastian L. Gorka, a member of the faculty of the College of International Security Affairs at the National Defense University, said on Tuesday that the Obama Administration is rapidly revising federal counter-terrorism training materials in order to eliminate references to Jihad and Islam.
Government bureaucracies usually take a long time in changing a policy. In this case, he said, "I have never, ever seen such a wide ranging review executed with such alacrity."

Although he blamed Quintan Wiktorowicz, a member of Obama's National Security Council, for implementing the Obama Administration's new overall policy of accommodating radical Islam, including the pro-terrorist Muslim Brotherhood, Gorka said Spencer Ackerman of Wired Magazine had helped sparked the review of federal counter-terrorism training materials through a series of controversial articles. One of those articles ran under an inflammatory headline about "Islamophobia" supposedly characterizing the federal government's response to global Islamic terrorism.

As a result of this kind of coverage and the new policy, Gorka said the Obama Administration today forbids the use of the word "Jihad" to describe the terrorists that target America for destruction, even though they are members of the Muslim religion and openly declare their Islamic aims. What is happening in terms of redefining the threat is "unprecedented" and dangerous, he said.

The battle against radical Islam has been transformed into a concern, under President Obama and his adviser Quintan Wiktorowicz, about "violent extremism," not Islamic terrorists or Islamists, he said.

Gorka said that the administration believes there are "good" Islamists and "bad" Islamists and the former can be dealt with. He said this policy is apparent in the decision by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to have contact with the Muslim Brotherhood "Supreme Guide" Mohammed Badei.