Monday, April 11, 2016
Dear Family & Friends,
It’s a beautiful day here in Israel today – sunny & cool – blue skies – rain predicted.
Let’s hope & pray it’s also calm & peaceful. We have a pair of huge hawks flying-soaring above us.
I remember past springs when they bring out their nestlings to teach them to fly.
Have a productive day & a restful night.
All the very best, Gail/Geula/Savta/Savta Raba x 2/Mom
Our Website is full of rich material: WinstonIsraelInsight.com
1.Islam is Colonialism, ‘Palestine’ is Colonialism by Daniel Greenfield
3.PM: Terrorism is declining thanks to our proactive policy
4.Jewish blood is not forfeit by Dr. Haim Shine
5.Inconvenient genocide By Caroline B Glick, JPOST
6.What about the Kurds? by Boaz Bismuth
7.Jordanian preacher questioned over Temple Mount
8.US admiral Lyons’ message still on point: Islam is a political movement
9.Israel’s nuclear strategy: The rationality of pretended irrationality
10.Poll said to find Trump is least popular Republican candidate among Jewish voters:
Cruz rails against Trump at Republican Jewish gathering
11.Sanders has ‘no opinion’ on 1967 borders
13.Revealed: Einstein blamed US for not stopping Nazis
14.Dry Bones by Ya’acov Kirschen “Out of Slavery”
1.Islam is Colonialism, ‘Palestine’ is Colonialism
by Daniel Greenfield
Muslims invaded, conquered and settled Israel as they did in other places, like India, that had an indigenous population. Advocates for ‘Palestine’ are not fighting colonialism, they are promoting it. Arutz Sheva IsraelNationalNews.com Published: Monday, April 11, 2016 7:22 AM
Daniel Greenfield
The writer is a popular New York City based freelance commentator and a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center. He blogs at sultanknish.blogspot.com. 
At Israeli Apartheid Week, campus haters claim to be fighting “colonialism” by fighting Jews. Columbia University’s Center for ‘Palestine’ Studies, dedicated to a country that doesn’t exist and which has produced nothing worth studying except terrorism, features diatribes such as ‘Palestine’ Re-Covered: Reading a Settler Colonial Landscape”. This word salad is a toxic stew of historical revisionism being used to justify the Muslim settler colonization of the indigenous Jewish population.
You can’t colonize ‘Palestine’ because you can’t colonize colonizers. The Muslim population in Israel is a foreign colonist population. The indigenous Jewish population can resettle its own country, but it can’t colonize it.
Muslims invaded, conquered and settled Israel. They forced their language and laws on the population. That’s the definition of colonialism. You can’t colonize and then complain that you’re being colonized when the natives take back the power that you stole from them.
There are Muslims in Israel for the same reason that there are Muslims in India. They are the remnants of a Muslim colonial regime that displaced and oppressed the indigenous non-Muslim population.
There are no serious historical arguments to be made against any of this.
The Muslim conquests and invasions are well-documented. The Muslim settlements fit every historical template of colonialism complete with importing a foreign population and social system that was imposed on the native population. Until they began losing wars to the indigenous Jewish population, the Muslim settlers were not ashamed of their colonial past, they gloried in it. Their historical legacy was based on seizing indigenous sites, appropriating them and renaming them after the new conquerors.
The only reason there’s a debate about the Temple Mount is because Caliph Omar conquered Jerusalem and ordered a mosque built on a holy Jewish site. The only reason there’s a debate about East Jerusalem is because invading Muslim armies seized half the city in 1948, bombed synagogues and ethnically cleansed the Jewish population to achieve an artificial Muslim settler majority.
You can’t switch from being the indigenous population to being its conquerors whenever it suits your pseudo-historical narrative. You can’t claim to be the Philistines, the Jews and their Islamic conquerors at the same time.
The only Muslim claim to Jerusalem or to any other part of Israel is based purely on the enterprise of colonial violence. There is no Muslim claim to Israel based on anything other than colonialism, invasion and settlement.
Israel is littered with Omar mosques, including one built in the courtyard of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, because Islam is a colonial entity whose mosques testify to their invasive origins by celebrating colonialism as their true religion. The faith of Islam is the sworn religion of the sword.
Islam is a religion of colonialism that spread through invasion, settlement and conquest. Its caliphs, from the original invaders, including Omar, to the current Caliph of ISIS, wielded and wield religious authority in the service of the Islamic colonial enterprise.
Allah is the patron deity of colonialism. Jihad is just colonialism in Arabic. Islamic theology is nothing but the manifest destiny of the Muslim conquest of the world, colonial settler enterprises dressed up in the filmy trappings of religion appropriated from the culture of conquered Jewish and Christian minorities. Muslim terrorism is a reactionary colonial response to the liberation movements of the indigenous Jewish population.
Even “Allahu Akbar” did not originate as a religious sentiment. It does not mean “God is Great”, as it is often mistranslated. It was Mohammed’s taunt to the Jews he was ethnically cleansing. His purge of a minority group proved that “Allah was Greater”. Islamic colonialism is used to demonstrate the existence of Allah. And the best way to worship Allah is through the colonialism of the Jihad.
Islam would not have existed without colonialism. It still can’t exist without it. That is why the violence continues. The only way to end the violence is for Muslims to reject their theology of colonialism.
But instead of taking ownership of their real history, the Muslim settler population evades its guilt through propaganda by claiming to be the victims of colonialism by the indigenous Jewish population. This twisted historical revisionism is backed by bizarre nonsense such as claiming that Jesus was a Palestinian or that the Arabs are descended from the Philistines. The Muslim settlers insist on continuing to celebrate colonialism while claiming to be an indigenous population that was always living in Israel.
You can have one or the other. You can have your mosques celebrating the conquest and suppression of the indigenous population or your claims of being the indigenous population. But you can’t switch from being the indigenous population to being its conquerors whenever it suits your pseudo-historical narrative. You can’t claim to be the Philistines, the Jews and their Islamic conquerors at the same time.
From its Roman origins, ‘Palestine’ has always been a colonial fantasy of remaking Israel by erasing its original Jewish identity. The Arab mercenaries who were deployed by the Romans in that original colonial enterprise continued it by becoming self-employed conquerors for their own colonial empire. The name ‘Palestine’ remains a linguistic settlement for reimagining a country without a people and a past as a blank slate on which the colonial identity of the invaders can be written anew. That is still the role that the ‘Palestine’ myth and mythology serves.
Abdul Rahim al-Shaikh complains about “linguistic colonialism”. When Muslims rename the Spring of Elisha, a Jewish biblical figure, Ein as-Sultan in honor of an Islamic colonial ruler, that’s linguistic colonialism. When Jews restore the original indigenous names that Jewish sites held before Muslim colonialism, that’s not colonization. It’s the exact opposite. It’s decolonization.
Promoting mythical claims of a ‘Palestinian state’ isn’t decolonization, it’s colonization. Or recolonization. Advocates for ‘Palestine’ are not fighting colonialism, but promoting it. They are advocating for a discredited Muslim settler fantasy & against the indigenous Jewish population of Israel.
Abdul Rahim al-Shaikh complains about “geographic amnesia” among “Palestinians”. There’s no geographic amnesia because you can’t remember what never existed. There’s only paramnesia because there was never a country named ”Palestine”.
”Palestine” has no history. It has no people. It has no borders. It has never been anything except a colonial invention. It is a name used by a variety of foreign settlers operating on behalf of colonial empires.
You can’t colonize ”Palestine”. How can you colonize a colonial myth? You can only decolonize it.
Every Jewish home built on land formerly under the control of the Caliphs is decolonization and decaliphization.
When Jews ascend the Temple Mount, they are also engaging in decolonization and decaliphization.
When the liberation forces of the Jewish indigenous population shoot a Jihadist colonist fighting to impose yet another Islamic State on Israel, that too is decolonization and decaliphization.
Resistance to Islamic terrorism is resistance to colonialism. And Jews have the longest history of resisting the Islamic State under its various Caliphs throughout history. Israel is still resisting the colonialist Jihadist plans for the restorations of the Caliphate.
Zionism is a machine that kills Islamic colonialism.
The existence of Israel not only means the decolonization of Abdul Rahim al-Shaikh’s imaginary colonial fantasies of “’Palestine’”, but inspires resistance in peoples struggling against Islamic colonialism throughout the region, from the Copts to the Berbers to secular intellectuals fighting for freedom.
Islamic colonialism has always been defeated, whether at the Gates of Vienna or in the Sinai Desert. Its colonial fantasies are false and will be defeated as many times as it takes, whether in the form of ‘Palestine’ or ISIS.
The writer blogs at sultanknish.blogspot.
Islam is Colonialism, ‘Palestine’ is Colonialism by Daniel Greenfield
2.Two more Jews, including soldier, arrested in Shin Bet crackdown
Both suspects – including one IDF soldier – denied legal counsel in unusual wave of arrests.
By Arutz Sheva staff First Publish: 4/11/2016, 11:25 AM
Protests after Duma arrest wave (file) – ‘Jews Don’t Torture Jews’
Two Israeli Jews were arrested overnight Sunday/Monday, as part of an ongoing investigation by the Israel Security Agency (ISA or Shin Bet). One of the arrestees, an IDF soldier, was arrested by Military Police while on base.
Both detainees have been prohibited from meeting with legal counsel, legal rights organization attorney Hai Bar stated Monday, under a special directive and gag order.
Bar noted that issuing such an order against an IDF soldier is highly unusual, and has not been implemented in years.
Last week, the Shin Bet arrested three Jews in connection to the case, denying them legal counsel as well.
The court has imposed a gag order over the case, including what charges those suspects are being accused of.
A hearing for the original three suspects is scheduled for Monday at the Petach Tikva Magistrate’s Court; a protest from family and friends has been arranged for outside the courtroom, over fear the three are being denied their legal rights and are facing torture.
Similarities have been drawn between the case and the ISA investigation over the deadly Duma arson, which Israeli authorities say is the work of an alleged “Jewish terror” network.
During the Duma trials, a number of young Jewish activists were detained for prolonged periods of time and interrogated harshly, but most of those suspects were eventually released after it was revealed they were not connected to any such crimes.
Two more Jews, including soldier, arrested in Shin Bet crackdown
3.PM: Terrorism is declining thanks to our proactive policy |
PM Benjamin Netanyahu says recent decrease in number of Palestinian terrorist attacks is “a result of this government’s aggressive, responsible and systematic policy” • PM: “We will continue to take strong action against Palestinian incitement.” By Israel Hayom Staff
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – Photo credit: AP |
At Sunday’s cabinet meeting in Jerusalem, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu credited the recent decline in Palestinian terrorism to proactive steps taken by his government.
Referring to Shin Bet data that shows a significant and steady decrease in the number of Palestinian terrorist attacks, Netanyahu said: “I say this with great caution because this trend could reverse, but we know this [decrease] has been achieved as a result of this government’s aggressive, responsible and systematic policy. And I want to commend the IDF, Shin Bet and Israel Police for their implementation of this policy.”
The prime minister went on to thank soldiers and police for their alertness, noting that a “combined offensive and defensive effort has led to terrorist elements succeeding less.”
“A key factor in the spread of terrorism, in our region and others, is success,” Netanyahu said. “If we reduce the success [of terrorists], we reduce the [number of people taking part in terrorism]. This is the main crux of what we are doing and we will continue to do so. At the same time, we will also, of course, continue to take very strong action against the incitement of the Palestinian public.”
PM: Terrorism is declining thanks to our proactive policy
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4.Jewish blood is not forfeit  by Dr. Haim Shine
The sane part of the Israeli public needs to rapidly come to terms with the profound significance of a recent declaration made by Zionist Union MK Zouheir Bahloul — that in his view, a Palestinian who tries to murder an IDF soldier is “not a terrorist.” In simple terms, he said that a terrorist is not a terrorist. What are we, and the terrorists for that matter, to make of all this? That Jewish blood is forfeit? Bahloul explained his remark by saying that “in the eyes of Israelis, anyone who fights for their freedom and independence is a terrorist.” Now the great freedom fighters of human history are turning over in their graves at being compared to those evil, inhumane people who, in the name of some twisted jihadist ideology, jeopardize even the slightest possibility of coexistence between Jews and Arabs in Israel. Bahloul’s comments are in essence an express call on Arabs in Israel and on Palestinians in Judea and Samaria to join the violence, because it is not terrorism; it is an ethos of freedom. If Bahloul’s sentiments represent the views of Israeli Arabs who voted for the Zionist Union then there is no more room for Leftist leaders’ word games, empty declarations or sanctimonious headlines. Bahloul and fellow Israeli Arab MKs Hanin Zoabi and Jamal Zahalka (Joint Arab List) are voicing their true beliefs and the truth can no longer be concealed. The real battle is not over the 1967 borders — it is over the 1948 borders. It is about Israel’s right to exist as the nation state of the Jewish people. If they realize the implications of their statements, then they are the Middle East’s biggest pyromaniacs. If in fact they don’t realize that they are rapidly slipping down a dangerous slope, they need to watch their steps before it is too late. With their delusional actions and destructive rhetoric, these MKs have been building a proverbial iron wall, separating Jews and Arabs in Israel. It is a wall of abysmal hatred, bloodshed and catastrophe. They can play the race card all they want, But claims of racism will never justify the fuel they keep adding to the ever-growing fire of animosity between the veteran Jewish national movement and the new Arab nationalism. If it wants to survive, the Israeli democracy needs to wake up and take action. Democracy cannot be used as a means of committing suicide. It cannot be used to advise Palestinian leaders to participate in Gaza blockade-busting flotillas; it cannot be used to demand the land on which Israeli kibbutzim are built for a Palestinian state; it cannot be used to encourage terrorism. If one wishes to be a member of Israel’s Knesset, they cannot express such sentiments. If they want to establish a resistance movement, they are welcome to do so, but they cannot do it while sitting in the Knesset halls and waving the flags of freedom and respect that belong to Israeli democracy. The leaders of the Zionist Union must draw their conclusions fast. If they want to survive in the political sphere, they must remove Bahloul from the party immediately. Any delay will expose the fact that the Zionist Union is an empty title. The moderate Arab public must take a stand and actively condemn Bahloul’s dangerous remarks, because their silence makes them appear complicit, thus making them responsible for the outcome. |
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Jewish blood is not forfeit by Dr. Haim Shine
| | 5.Inconvenient genocide By Caroline B Glick, JPOST The Christian communities of Iraq, Syria, Egypt and Lebanon are well on the way to joining their Jewish cousins. The Jewish communities of these states predated Islam by a millennium, and were vibrant until the 20th century. But the Arab world’s war on the Jewish state, and more generally on Jews, wiped out the Jewish populations several decades ago. Now the Christian communities, which like the Jews, predate Islam, are being targeted for eradication. The ongoing genocide of Middle Eastern Christians at the hands of Sunni jihadists is a moral outrage. Does it also affect Israeli national interests? What do we learn from the indifference of Western governments – led by the Obama administration – to their annihilation? True, after years of deliberately playing down the issue and denying the problem, the Obama administration is finally admitting it exists. Embarrassed by the US House of Representatives’ unanimous adoption of a resolution last month recognizing that Middle Eastern Christians are being targeted for genocide, the State Department finally acknowledged the obvious on March 25, when Secretary of State John Kerry stated that Islamic State is conducting a “genocide of Christians, Yazidis and Shi’ites.” Kerry’s belated move, which State Department lawyers were quick to insist has no operational significance, raises two questions. First, what took the Obama administration so long? Persecution of Christians in Iraq began immediately after the US-led coalition brought down Saddam Hussein in 2003. With the rise of Islamic State in 2012, the process of destroying the Christian community went into high gear. Now these ancient communities are on the brink of extinction. In Iraq, Christians comprised 8 percent of the population in 2003. Today less than 1% of Iraqis are Christians. In Syria, the Christian community has lost between half and two-thirds of its members in the past five years. One of the appalling aspects of ISIS’s deliberate, open targeting of Christians for destruction is how little resistance it has received from local Sunni populations. As Raymond Ibrahim from the David Horowitz Freedom Center has scrupulously documented, the local Sunnis have not stood up for their Christian neighbors, who have lived side-by-side with them for hundreds of years. Rather, in areas that have been conquered by ISIS, the local Sunnis have collaborated with their genocidal masters in raping and murdering Christian neighbors, plundering their property, destroying their churches, and driving them from their ancestral homes. Although precise data is hard to come by, it is clear that thousands of Christians have been slaughtered. Thousands of Christian women and girls have been sold as sex slaves in ISIS slave markets, subjected to continuous, violent rape and beatings. Nuns and priests have been enslaved, crucified, mutilated, kidnapped and held for ransom, as have lay members of Christian communities. Christians have been burned alive. For years, the administration said that the persecution doesn’t amount to genocide because according to ISIS’s propaganda, Christians are allowed to remain in their homes if they agree to live as dhimmis – that is, without any human rights, and subjected to confiscatory taxation. But as Nina Shea from the Hudson Institute has reported, these claims were shown to be false in Mosul, Nineveh and other places where ISIS has claimed that such practices were instituted. The jihadist genocide of Christians isn’t limited to Iraq and Syria. Boko Haram – ISIS’s affiliate in Nigeria – is undertaking a systematic campaign to annihilate Christianity in Africa. ISIS’s affiliates in Sinai and Libya have similarly targeted Christians, staging mass beheadings & other monstrous acts. Of course, a region needn’t be under direct ISIS control for Christians to be targeted for destruction. The Easter massacre in Pakistan was further evidence that wherever radical Islamists gain power, they use it to murder Christians. Larry Franklin from Gatestone Institute noted in a recent article, the exodus of Christians from the Palestinian Authority is the direct consequence of deliberate persecution of Christians by the PA. Given the prevalence of Christian persecution, why is the West – which is overwhelmingly Christian – so reticent about mentioning it? Why are Western leaders loathe to do anything to stop it? There are two ways to end genocide. First, you can defeat those conducting it on the battlefield. If you destroy the forces conducting the genocide, then the genocide ends. The second way you can stop genocide is by evacuating the targeted population and providing its members with refuge. After stipulating that ISIS is carrying out a genocide, Kerry made clear that the US will not defeat ISIS to end it. Instead, Kerry said, “We must bear in mind… that the best response to genocide is a reaffirmation of the fundamental right to survive of every group targeted for destruction. What Daesh [ISIS] wants to erase, we must preserve. That requires defeating Daesh, but it also requires the rejection of discrimination and bigotry.” Kerry then explained that the US’s plan is to cultivate the formation of a multicultural society in Syria. Given the brutal nature of the war, Kerry’s plan is tantamount to saying the US intends to defeat ISIS and rescue those it is currently exterminating by bringing unicorns and leprechauns to the slave markets of Raqqa. Substantively, Kerry’s plan is to deny Christians refuge, and to abandon them to the mercy of their murderers. While delusional, Kerry’s statement was in line with the Obama administration’s timid, feckless military campaign against ISIS. Everyone knows that the US military could take down ISIS in a matter of weeks if Obama ordered it to do so. But rather than act decisively, the US has limited its operations to timorous aerial bombing. By conducting a barely there campaign, Obama tells the world that although he will be happy to take credit for any defeat ISIS suffers, he will not allow the US to lead the fight against the jihadist death machine. As for providing refuge to the populations targeted with genocide, the raw data make clear that Obama does just the opposite. He is providing refuge for Sunni Muslims, who are not being targeted for genocide, which is being conducted by Sunni Muslims. As Ibrahim has documented, although Christians made up 10% of the Syrian population in 2011, they comprise a mere 2.7% of the Syrian refugees the Obama administration has allowed into the US. And when presidential hopeful Senator Ted Cruz called for the US to provide refuge to Christians, who pose no security threat and are targeted with genocide and persecution while banning Muslim immigration, Obama accused him of bigotry. Despite the fact that FBI Director James Comey told Congress that the US lacked the capacity to effectively screen Muslims from Syria for ties to jihadist groups, Obama said that a policy of saving those marked for extinction over those who come from the population conducting the genocide is “shameful,” and “not American.” Beyond refusing to take the necessary steps to ensure that persecuted Christians are rescued from annihilation, the State Department has been rejecting visa requests from Christian activists and leaders from persecuted communities to visit the US to share information about their suffering with the American public. This, at the same time that the administration has welcomed Muslim jihad sympathizers, including Muslim Brotherhood members, to Washington. For instance, last May, the State Department denied a visa to Sister Diana Momeka, an Iraqi nun and ISIS survivor. Momeka was the only Christian member of a delegation of persecuted minorities. Representatives of every other group received visas. It took a public outcry to force the State Department to reverse its decision. Also last year, the State Department gave visas to all Muslim regional governors in northern Nigeria to participate in a conference sponsored by the US Institute of Peace. They denied a visa to the region’s only Christian governor, Jonah David Jang. Christian activists alleged that Jang was denied a visa because he spoke up to US officials about anti-Christian persecution in 12 states in northern Nigeria that have instituted Sharia law. What accounts for this behavior? The answer is not ignorance, but ideologically-motivated bigotry. The Aid to the Church in Need organization explained in its 2015 report on Christian persecution, “Christians have been targeted [because]… Christianity [is seen] as a foreign ‘colonial’ import. Christians are seen as linked to the West, which is perceived as corrupt and exploitative.” In another report, the group explained that the Western media has avoided covering the story of the Islamic genocide of Middle East Christians because of “misplaced embarrassment about the 19th-century colonial powers evangelizing ‘the natives’ in far flung places.” In other words, Middle Eastern Christians, whose communities predate Islam, are targeted because they are perceived as Western implants. And the West ignores their suffering, because the Left in the West perceives them as Western implants. In both cases, prejudices, rooted on the one hand in jihadist Islam, and on the other hand in Western self-hatred and post-colonialism, reach the same bigoted conclusion: the only “authentic” people in the Middle East are Muslims. Everybody else is a colonial implant. And as such, they deserve what they get. This then brings us back to Israel, and the Jews. The same ideological prejudice that refuses to recognize that the Islamic State is Islamic, refuses to recognize that jihad is unique to Islam, refuses to recognize that Christians as religious minorities are being targeted for annihilation, and refuses to recognize that the Christians of the Middle East are ancient peoples who have lived in their communities since the dawn of Christianity, also refuse to recognize the rights of the Jewish people as the indigenous people of the land of Israel. This is the reason that Western governments, led by the Obama administration, are unwilling to defeat ISIS. This is why they are giving preference to Muslim asylum-seekers, who they are incapable of screening, over Christians, who it is unnecessary to screen. This is the reason that the same governments are far more willing to attack Jews for living beyond the 1949 armistice lines, in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria – the cradle of Jewish civilization and the heartland of the land of Israel, than they are willing to end their support for the PA which sponsors and celebrates terrorism. This is why the same governments eagerly embrace every allegation of Israeli racism, real or imagined, while they ignore, or even fund racist Palestinian efforts to deny Jewish history, a history which leads to the inevitable conclusion that the Jews are the indigenous people of the land of Israel. The reason Obama refuses to protect Middle East Christians from extinction is because he cannot rescue them – either on the ground or by ensuring they can flee to safety – without abandoning his ideological faith that the only “natives” of the Middle East are the Muslims. ============= Please contribute to The Freeman Center’s essential educational activities. Mail check to address above or by paypal: http://www.freeman.org/paypal.htm Inconvenient genocide By Caroline B Glick 6.What about the Kurds?  by Boaz Bismuth Turkey always espoused a policy of zero conflicts. For years Ankara believed this was the best way to enhance its international standing — even at the expense of the United States. Up until recently, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had some very lofty aspirations, but something went wrong with his plan. The Turks now find themselves in the middle of a global war of terror, and instead of zero conflicts they have zero friendly neighbors. If that weren’t enough, inside Turkey are millions of refugees and far too many bombings. At this rate, Turkey will also find itself with zero accomplishments. The emerging Turkish-Israeli reconciliation needs to be put in precisely this context. It’s not easy for Ankara to suddenly be alone in the neighborhood, friendless: The Iranians were never true partners; the bitter enemy Bashar Assad, who had one foot in the grave, received a stay of execution and a new hold on his country from Putin, who became Ankara’s biggest new enemy ever since a Russian spy plane was shot out of the sky. The Europeans as well, despite agreements in place, are not really partners. This has been especially true since it became apparent that Islamic State terrorist, utilizing the Turkish double game, crossed the Syrian border and eventually into Europe to carry out terrorist attacks. Of course, reports of oil deals between Turkey and ISIS, exposed by the Russians, have not helped Ankara’s image in the world. If we closely examine Turkey’s extremely opportunistic policies from the past decade, we will see that Ankara has rightfully earned its current predicament. Of all countries, however, Israel, which for decades has been the victim of Palestinian terrorist organizations, has reason to stand by Turkey in these difficult days. Although the sides have yet to settle the two issues at the heart of their discord, namely Hamas operating out of Istanbul and the blockade of Gaza, which Ankara wants lifted, it appears Turkey is inclined to close the gaps. That is, of course, unless someone in Ankara believes this is still the time for playing games. The Counterterrorism Bureau on Friday issued a rare warning, calling on Israelis visiting Turkey to leave the country immediately, and on those planning trips there to postpone them. The Americans, almost simultaneously, issued a similar warning. We can assume that both warnings are based on the same information. Turkey today is on the defensive against ISIS and the Kurdish PKK. In the past, Turkey acted according to its own set of priorities. While the world saw ISIS as a threat, Turkey saw it as an opportunity to yet again prevent the establishment of an independent Kurdish state. This perhaps is the point that Israel needs to ponder, in a Middle East that is not only changing but being reconstructed. From a historical perspective, the Kurds have always stood by our side. We too, in various times throughout history, have stood by them. The Kurds, along with Israel, are the most formidable pro-Western force in the Middle East today. The manner in which they have confronted ISIS in Syria and Iraq (representing the only significant force on the ground) obligates the international community to compensate them. The question of an independent Kurdistan is undoubtedly a legitimate one, which for some reason or another is being pushed aside. Various parliaments across the globe, among them the French, were quick to recognize Palestine while inexplicably forgetting about Kurdistan. One of Israel’s main problems in the way of recognizing Kurdish self-determination was its fruitful cooperation with Turkey. The Israeli-Turkish rift could have pushed Israel to consummate something that began in the 1950s in Iraq, and put into practice the axiom stipulating that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” Perhaps this is the exact reason that Erdogan, who understands we are living in a changing world, would rather be friends again. |
What about the Kurds? by Boaz Bismuth
7.Jordanian preacher questioned over Temple Mount incitement |
Jordanian government outraged over detention of Sheikh Muhammad Salim, who was released from police custody after questioning Friday • Waqf officials say they will not allow security cameras inside mosques at the site, as agreed to by Jordan and Israel. By Efrat Forsher & Daniel Siryoti IsraelHaYom |
Muslim worshippers on the Temple Mount [Archive] – Photo credit: AP [Gail Sez: Note backsides face Temple Mount]
Jerusalem District police officers on Friday afternoon briefly detained Jordanian Sheikh Muhammad Salim for questioning after the Muslim preacher made inciting remarks during a sermon he delivered at Al-Aqsa mosque on the Temple Mount.
A crowd of worshippers gathered at the scene to protest Salim’s arrest, chanting “Allahu akbar.”
Salim was released from custody after he was questioned by the police.
The Jordanian government, meanwhile, was outraged over the incident.
Jordanian Religious Trusts Minister Hail Daoud harshly condemned Salim’s arrest and told Jordan’s Petra News Agency, “This is an unacceptable action by the Israeli authorities, who arrested a religious official fulfilling his duties at Friday prayers.”
Daoud strongly denied Israel’s claim that Salim’s was arrested for delivering a sermon that allegedly contained messages aimed to incite and ferment unrest.
Meanwhile, Jordanian Waqf officials on the Temple Mount declared they would not allow security cameras to be installed inside the mosques at the site, and that the dozens of video cameras earmarked for the closed-circuit surveillance system, agreed upon by Israel and Jordan, would only be installed outside the mosques. As a reminder, the agreement to install the security cameras at the complex was reached with the intent of preventing violence at the site, as well as to identify provocateurs.
Additionally, in recent days fliers were distributed on the Temple Mount giving Muslim worshippers a directive to “break the security cameras that the Zionist occupier places at Al-Aqsa.”
Jordanian preacher questioned over Temple Mount incitement
8.US admiral’s message still on point: Islam is a political movement |
Address by retired U.S. Navy Admiral James Lyons at a conference on terrorism goes viral • “Until we recognize that Islam is a political movement masquerading as a religion, we are never going to come to grips with it,” Lyons tells conference. By Erez Linn & News Agencies IsraelHaYom 
Retired U.S. Navy Admiral James Lyons |
About a year ago, retired U.S. Navy Admiral James Lyons addressed a conference on terrorism in Washington, D.C. Since then, his remarks at the conference have gone viral, perhaps because, in retrospect, what he said was almost prophetic. Speaking at the Center for Security Policy in February 2015, the retired admiral cited remarks by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who, explaining efforts to enhance his country’s Islamic character in 2007, said that “the term ‘moderate Islam’ is very ugly, it is offensive and an insult to our religion. There is no moderate or immoderate Islam. Islam is Islam and that’s it.” He cited another remark, made by Erdogan in the 1990s while still mayor of Istanbul: “Democracy is a train that takes you to your destination, and then you get off.” In his remarks, Lyons argued that Erdogan “could not have said it any plainer,” warning that “until you recognize that Islam is a political movement masquerading as a religion, you are never going to come to grips with it.” Lyons addressed the conference several months after a coalition led by the United States began fighting the Islamic State group in the Middle East and about a month after Islamist terrorists murdered 11 people at the offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris. Lyons mentioned in his remarks that in the 1980s, while Ronald Reagan was president, a joint French-American strike plan was devised, but was scrapped due to opposition by then-U.S. Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger. “Weinberger wouldn’t issue the order,” he recalled. “I personally talked to [then-Secretary of State] George Shultz and [then-National Security Adviser] Bud McFarlane and they told me they pleaded with him and he wouldn’t do it.” He mentioned that in 1987, when American forces clashed with Iran in the Persian Gulf, there was a plan to “take down” the regime of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, but again it was a member of the administration, this time Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff William J. Crowe, who “undercut” the operation. The admiral also criticized President Barack Obama, saying that he is unwilling to recruit the West to wage all-out war against radical Islam. “The Obama administration has a strategy, and any thinking American should be able to grasp it,” he said. “It is anti-American, anti-Western, it’s pro-Islamic, pro-Iranian and pro-Muslim Brotherhood.” |
US admiral’s message still on point: Islam is a political movement |
9.Israel’s nuclear strategy: The rationality of pretended irrationality by Prof. Louis René Beres
Looking ahead, Israel will have to rely increasingly on a multi-faceted doctrine of nuclear deterrence because of the nature of its enemies. Arutz Sheva IsraelNationalNews.com April 11, 2016 6:45am
Prof. Louis René Beres
The writer (Ph.D, Princeton, 1971) is emeritus 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.…
ISRAEL’S NUCLEAR STRATEGY: EXPLORING THE RATIONALITY OF PRETENDED IRRATIONALITY By Louis René Beres Emeritus Professor of International Law, Purdue University
Special to Arutz Sheva Israel National News, 10 April 2016
“The rational is not thinkable without its other, the non-rational & it never appears in reality without it.” (Karl Jaspers, Reason and Existence (1935))
Normally, philosophical discussions of reason and rationality seem very distant from concrete considerations of military strategy, especially from those matters pertaining to nuclear strategy. Nonetheless, in complex matters of nuclear deterrence, correctly anticipating the complex calculations of an enemy will always require careful attention to such arcane considerations. More precisely, in the guiding spirit of Karl Jaspers’ more general understanding (above) of the indivisibility of rationality and irrationality, the policy architects of any actual Israeli strategy of nuclear deterrence will need to explore (1) the inherent interdependence of these two concepts; and (2) the various ways in which this core connection might best be exploited.
To begin, Israel’s strategic planners must attempt to ascertain whether a particular adversary will actually be rational. This means determining whether the relevant adversary will always value its collective survival (either as a state, or as an organized terror group) more highly than any other preference, or combination of preferences. Another obligation here, depending in part upon this prior judgment concerning expected enemy rationality, will be for Israel to assess whether a strategy of “pretended irrationality” could enhance its own nuclear deterrence posture.
These two determinations need not be mutually exclusive, of course, and any nuclear weapons state (not just Israel) could reasonably decide to address both questions at the same time.
Here, however, our analytic focus will be limited to the tiny and perpetually beleaguered State of Israel, a country of such starkly limited mass that, even in its entirety, is smaller than America’s Lake Michigan.
There is more. Israel’s enemies, it must always be kept in mind, include both state and sub-state foes. In dealing with Israel, each discrete class of enemies could sometime choose to feign irrationality – a potentially clever strategy, selected to “get a jump” on Israel in any expected or already-ongoing competition for “escalation dominance.” Naturally, these very same enemies could sometime decide, either consciously or unwittingly, to be irrational. In any such case, it would be incumbent upon Israeli planners to very capably assess which form of irrationality – pretended or real – is actually underway.
By definition, genuine enemy irrationality would mean valuing certain specific preferences (e.g., presumed Islamic religious obligations or personal and/or regime safety) more highly than collective survival. For Israel, the threatening prospect of a genuinely irrational nuclear adversary is still most worrisome with regard to Iran. For ample reason, there is little confidence, in Israel, that the 14 July Vienna (P5 + 1) Agreement will have any tangibly inhibiting effect on Iranian nuclearization. Although this lack of confidence may or may not be justified, it is always worth remembering seventeenth-century English philosopher Thomas Hobbes’ warning in Leviathan: “Covenants, without the sword, are but words….”
With these points in mind, how then should Israel best proceed? In narrowly military terms, the very best option might still seem to be preemption; that is, a defensive first-strike directed against Iran’s pertinent hard targets. Yet, it is already very late for launching any operationally “cost-effective” preemption against Iran, and – even if it could be properly defended in law as “anticipatory self-defense” – such action would probably come at a much too- substantial human and political cost.
In essence, this implies a now primary obligation, for Israel, to focus alternatively, on steadily enhancing its own nuclear deterrence posture. Jerusalem should always bear in mind this posture’s core focus on prevention, rather than on punishment. By definition, using its own presumed nuclear forces for vengeance rather than deterrence, would miss the point.[1] Arguably, in fact, any such Israeli use, even as a residually default option, would be not only purposeless, but also manifestly irrational.
There is more. Israel’s nuclear deterrent must always be backed up by appropriate systems of active defense BMD (Ballistic Missile Defense), but especially if there should be good reason to fear an irrational nuclear adversary. Although it is well-known that no system of active defense, including even Israel’s very promising Arrow, can ever be “leak-proof,” there is still reason to suppose that certain BMD deployments could help safeguard both Israeli civilian populations (soft targets) and Israeli nuclear retaliatory forces (hard targets). It follows, inter alia, that Arrow and certain corollary systems (e.g., Iron Dome and David’s Sling) will indefinitely remain a necessary complement to the Jewish State’s offensive nuclear deterrence posture.
“Everything is very simple in war,” says Clausewitz, in On War, “but the simplest thing is still difficult.” To progress in its national security obligations, Israel’s military planners must expressly identify the prioritized goals of the Jewish State’s nuclear deterrence posture. Before a rational adversary of Israel could be suitably deterred by an Israeli nuclear deterrent, that enemy would first need to believe that Israel had assuredly maintained both the capacity to launch appropriate nuclear reprisals for certain forms of aggression (nuclear, and perhaps non-nuclear), and also the will to undertake any such uniquely consequential launch.
In more perplexing matters involving any expectedly irrational nuclear enemy,[2] successful Israeli deterrence would then need to be based upon credible threats to enemy values other than national survival.
It will be in Israel’s long-term survival interests to continue to commit to assorted submarine-basing nuclear options. Otherwise…Israel’s land-based strategic nuclear forces could sometime present to an existential enemy as invitingly too-vulnerable.
Israel will also need to demonstrate, among several things, the substantial invulnerability of its own nuclear retaliatory forces to any enemy first strike aggressions. More precisely, it will be in Israel’s long-term survival interests to continue to commit to assorted submarine-basing nuclear options.[3] Otherwise, as it is easy to contemplate, Israel’s land-based strategic nuclear forces could sometime present to an existential enemy as invitingly too-vulnerable.
Whether or not Israel should proceed to more explicit submarine-basing of its presumed nuclear retaliatory forces, Jerusalem could still benefit from a carefully controlled and incrementally phased end to “deliberate nuclear ambiguity.” Without such a calculated termination to the country’s “bomb in the basement,” there could arise certain serious enemy doubts about Israel’s nuclear deterrent, troubling questions that could sometime prove even more persuasive that Israel’s perceived willingness and capacity to make good on its still only implicit nuclear retaliatory threats.
Looking ahead, Israel will have to rely increasingly on a multi-faceted doctrine of nuclear deterrence. In turn, specific elements of this “simple but difficult” doctrine will soon need to be rendered less “ambiguous.” This complex and nuanced modification will imply an even more determined focus on prospectively rational and irrational enemies, including, again, both national and sub-national foes.
To deal most successfully with its presumptively irrational or non-rational enemies, Israel will need to compose a more-or-less original strategic “playbook.” It may even be necessary for Israel to consider, at least on occasion, feigning irrationality itself. In such cases, however, it will be important for Jerusalem not to react in an ad hoc or “seat-of-the-pants” fashion, to each new strategic challenge, but rather to derive or extrapolate its specific policy reactions from a carefully pre-fashioned strategic nuclear doctrine. Without such a thoughtful doctrine as guide, pretended irrationality could quickly become a “double-edged sword,” effectively bringing more rather than less survival risk to Israel.
Years ago, when he was Minister of Defense, General Moshe Dayan (the legendary warrior, with the eye patch) had instructed: “Israel must be seen as a mad dog, too dangerous to bother.” Then, Dayan may already have seized upon an instructive and timely metaphor. Clausewitz, who had much earlier favored recognizable “audacity” in war, would have agreed.
There is one last, but still vital, observation. It is improbable, but not inconceivable, that certain of Israel’s principal enemies would be neither rational nor irrational, but mad.[4] While irrational decision-makers would already pose special problems for Israeli nuclear deterrence – because these decision-makers would not value collective survival more highly than any other preference, or combination of preferences – they could still be rendered susceptible to alternate forms of deterrence. For example, like rational decision-makers, they could still maintain a fixed, determinable, and “transitive” hierarchy of preferences. This means, at least in principle, that “merely” irrational enemies could still be successfully deterred.
Mad or “crazy” adversaries, on the other hand – and by definition – would have no such calculable hierarchy of preferences, and would therefore not be subject to any ordinary strategy of Israeli nuclear deterrence. Although it would likely be worse for Israel to have to face a mad nuclear enemy, than a “merely” irrational one, Jerusalem would have no foreseeable choice in this matter. This means that Israel, like it or not, will need to maintain, perhaps even indefinitely, a “three track” system of nuclear deterrence and defense, one track each for its identifiable adversaries that are presumed (1) rational; (2) irrational; or (3) mad. For the plainly unpredictable third track, special plans will also be needed for undertaking certain presumptively indispensable preemptions, and, simultaneously, for certain corresponding efforts at BMD (ballistic missile defense).[5]
However counter-intuitive, general philosophical discussions of reason and rationality could sometimes bear very directly upon vital considerations of a country’s nuclear strategy. In this regard, whatever complex national security planning Jerusalem should decide to undertake, Israel should never forget that rationality and irrationality are inevitably two sides of the same coin. Therefore, one can never appear, as we may learn from philosopher Karl Jasper’s 1935 commentary (above) on Kierkegaard and Nietzsche, without the other.
LOUIS RENÉ BERES is Emeritus Professor of Political Science and International Law at Purdue University. Educated at Princeton (Ph.D.,1971), he is the author of twelve books and several hundred published articles dealing with Israeli security matters. In Israel, he was Chair of Project Daniel (2003). Dr. Beres’ just-published book is titled, Surviving Amid Chaos: Israel’s Nuclear Strategy (Rowman & Littlefield).
Sources:
[1] This point was central to Israel’s Strategic Future, the Final Report of Project Daniel, Israel, 2004. Said this Report, “The primary point of Israel’s nuclear forces must always be deterrence ex ante, not revenge ex post.”
[2] See, on deterring a prospectively irrational nuclear Iran, Louis René Beres and General John T. Chain, “Could Israel Safely deter a Nuclear Iran?” The Atlantic, August 2012; and Professor Louis René Beres and General John T. Chain, “Israel; and Iran at the Eleventh Hour,” Oxford University Press (OUP Blog), February 23, 2012. General Chain was Commander-in-Chief, U.S. Strategic Air Command (CINCSAC).
[3] On the sea-basing issue, see Louis René Beres and Admiral Leon “Bud” Edney, “Israel’s Nuclear Strategy: A Larger Role for Submarine-Basing,” The Jerusalem Post, August 17, 2014; and Professor Louis René Beres and Admiral Leon “Bud” Edney, “A Sea-Based Nuclear Deterrent for Israel,” Washington Times, September 5, 2014. Admiral Edney was NATO Supreme Allied Commander, Atlantic (SACLANT).
[4] “Do you know what it means to find yourselves face to face with a madman,” asks Luigi Pirandello, in Henry IV, “with one who shakes the foundations of all you have built up in yourselves, your logic, and the logic of all your constructions?”
[5] On timely issues of Israeli BMD: ballistic missile defense, see: Louis René Beres and Major General (IDF/res.) Isaac Ben-Israel, “The Limits of Deterrence,” The Washington Times, November 21, 2007; Professor Louis René Beres and MG Isaac Ben-Israel, “Deterring Iran,” The Washington Times, June 10, 2007; and Professor Louis René Beres and MG Isaac Ben-Israel, “Deterring Iranian Nuclear Attack,” The Washington Times, January 27, 2009. Major General Ben-Israel was a Member of the IDF General Staff, and Head of the Israel Space Agency. He was also a member of Professor Beres’ Project Daniel (2003).
Israel’s nuclear strategy: The rationality of pretended irrationality by Prof. Louis René Beres
10.Poll said to find Trump is least popular Republican candidate among Jewish voters: Cruz rails against Trump at Republican Jewish gathering Presidential hopeful warns of ‘absolute disaster’ and ‘bloodbath’ for Republicans if front-runner Trump is their nomineeBY STEVE PEOPLES & JULIE BYKOWICZ April 10, 2016, 5:35 am Updated: April 10, 2016, 5:48 am 
Republican presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, speaks at the Republican Jewish Coalition spring leadership meeting, Saturday, April 9, 2016, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/John Locher) LAS VEGAS (AP) — His presidential rivals thousands of miles away, Ted Cruz warned Jewish donors on Saturday that Donald Trump could trigger a general election “bloodbath” for the Republican Party. “If Donald Trump is the nominee, it is an absolute disaster for Republicans, for conservatives and for the country,” the Texas senator declared, charging that Trump would jeopardize control of the House and the Senate and tilt the balance of power at the Supreme Court away from conservatives. Cruz earned a warm reception, yet his appearance came amid an overall sense of dissatisfaction from many Jewish Republicans, gathered for their annual spring meeting at an upscale hotel along the Las Vegas strip. Many prefer Cruz over Trump, but few were excited about either candidate. “It’s not a natural constituency for Ted Cruz, but over time, he’s won the war of attrition for some of these folks,” said Kellyanne Conway, a Republican operative leading a pro-Cruz super PAC. “He’s seen as the alternative to Donald Trump for many of these people.” Indeed, there were some vocal Trump supporters among the roughly 500 who attended the weekend gathering of the Republican Jewish Coalition, but they were in the minority. Trump irked Jewish leaders earlier in the year by promising to remain neutral on prospective peace negotiations with the Israelis and Palestinians. And while his speech to a pro-Israel group in Washington last month was well-received, Trump’s nativist rhetoric alienates some Jewish leaders who “are scared by the concept of Donald Trump and the presidency,” said Republican Jewish attorney Charlie Spies. “No American politician should be compared to Hitler because of the unique, horrific nature of the Nazi genocide,” said Spies, a former Jeb Bush supporter. “Having said that, there is an issue of tone and being able to whip up crowds, often directed at segments of society that get scapegoated. Anybody who has studied history would be concerned watching that.” Trump is the least popular Republican presidential candidate among America’s registered Jewish voters, according to a poll commissioned by the Republican Jewish Coalition and shared privately with board members over the weekend. The poll found that Ohio Gov. John Kasich was the overwhelming favorite Republican, while Cruz fell in the middle. Jewish voters represent roughly 3 percent of the American electorate, but have larger populations in swing states like Florida and Ohio. 
Republican presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, speaks at the Republican Jewish Coalition spring leadership meeting, Saturday, April 9, 2016, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/John Locher) Both Trump and Kasich declined invitations to attend the annual event, considered a can’t-miss for GOP candidates in recent years. Part of the reason: billionaire casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, a key member who hosts the event at his Venetian hotel resort, was the top political spender in the last presidential race, pouring $90 million of family money into that campaign. Trump and Kasich spent the day instead in New York ahead of the state’s April 19 primary election. There was little sign of Trump or Kasich representatives, but Cruz sent most of his senior team to the Las Vegas hotel. The list included campaign manager Jeff Roe, pollster Chris Wilson and its chief Jewish liaison, Nick Muzin. Pro-Cruz outside groups that can take unlimited contributions hosted simultaneous events in the same hotel to land donations. At least two former presidential candidates — Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and former Texas Gov. Rick Perry — were on hand as well, in addition to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, Florida Gov. Rick Scott and Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson. Adelson hasn’t been willing to place a bet in this year’s unpredictable Republican presidential contest, sending mixed signals about his candidate preference. Yet Cruz’s status as the only candidate to make the trip to Las Vegas on Saturday was noticed. “All three candidates were invited to attend our group today, but Sen. Cruz was the only one to accept our invitation,” said RJC board member Michael Epstein as the crowd applauded. Copyright 2016 The Associated Press. 11.Sanders has ‘no opinion’ on 1967 borders |
Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders continues to face questions about his knowledge, or lack thereof, of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict • Sanders reiterates view that Israel acted disproportionately during Operation Protective Edge. By Yoni Hersch, Erez Linn, Israel Hayom Staff & Reuters
Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders – Photo credit: AP |
Only days after falsely claiming that Israel killed more than 10,000 innocent Palestinians during Operation Protective Edge, Vermont Senator and Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders found himself on Friday again facing questions about his knowledge, or lack thereof, of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
In an MSNBC interview on Friday, Sanders was asked whether he had an opinion on whether Israel should withdraw to the 1967 borders. “Not at this point,” Sanders replied.
In the same MSNBC interview, Sanders said, “What I believe, first of all, is there are good people on both sides and there are political opportunists on both sides. As somebody who is Jewish, who has lived in Israel for a few months when I was a young man, who has family in Israel, I believe that of course the security of Israel, the independence of Israel, the right of Israel to live in peace and security, is paramount, but you have to recognize the plight of the Palestinians.
“I know that in America, in politics, maybe this is not something that is said very often. But we’re not going to have lasting peace unless we recognized that, in Gaza for example, the current situation is deplorable. People are living with horrific levels of poverty in an area that has been just annihilated. So what I think is you need a two-state solution and we’ll argue about the details of that.”
While Sanders noted that “Israel has a right to protect itself from terrorism” and that the amassing of weaponry in the Gaza Strip was “obviously unacceptable,” he went on to call Israel’s actions during Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014 “disproportionate.”
Regarding his false claim in a New York Daily News interview that Israel killed over 10,000 innocent Palestinians during Operation Protective Edge, Sanders said, “I did not know the exact number, but it turns out that, according to the United Nations, over 2,000 civilians were killed, and some 10,000 people were wounded. I think that is, you know, understanding that there was a war, I think that was a disproportionate reaction.”
Sanders is still wrong on the number of Palestinian civilians killed during Operation Protective Edge. According to an Israel Defense Forces analysis, 2,125 Palestinians — 44% of whom were combatants — were killed during the 50-day operation in Gaza in July-August 2014. Some 36% of the Palestinian fatalities were civilians, and the status of the other 20% was undetermined.
Meanwhile, at a campaign stop on Saturday at the Apollo Theater in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City, Sanders was heckled by a man who accused Jews of running Wall Street.
The man was booed by the audience and Sanders went on to say that he was proud of being Jewish, that he was a supporter of Israel but that the Palestinians, also, deserved consideration.
Sanders, who would be the first Jewish U.S. president if elected, extended a string of victories on Saturday by winning the Democratic nominating contest in Wyoming, besting rival Hillary Clinton as they gear up for a crucial matchup in New York on April 19.
Sanders has ‘no opinion’ on 1967 borders
TimesOfIsrael.com April 11, 2016, 11:33 Am
BLOGGER
Yisrael Medad, currently Information Resources Director at the Menachem Begin Heritage Center in Jerusalem, is American-born and made Aliyah in 1970. He resides in Shiloh since 1981. He was a member of the Betar Youth Movement World Executive and is a volunteer spokesperson for the Yesha council. He holds a MA in Political Science from the Hebrew University.
Reading any news item or analysis that relates to the right side of the political spectrum here in Israel, that is, what could be termed ‘nationalist’, ‘religious’, ‘conservative’. etc., is not only an art in itself, requiring special abilities but is very fraught with the possibility that one will never quite grasp what is going on.
Here is one small example.
Nir Hasson of Ha’aretz includes this in a report yesterday:
Meanwhile, according to Ir Amim, a nonprofit that seeks to make life in Jerusalem more equitable for Arab and Jewish residents, show that in 2015 the number of visits to the Temple Mount by Jews fell, for the first time in five years. In 2015, a total of 11,001 Jews visited the site, compared to 11,754 in 2014.
That was not just a simple piece of data. Hasson’s article opened thus:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised the Jordanians in November 2014 that he would stop Israeli politicians from visiting Jerusalem’s Temple Mount and limit visits by right-wing activists, according to a new report by an international organization devoted to resolving conflicts around the world. A local nongovernmental organization, meanwhile, reported declines in the number of Jews visiting the Temple Mount and in violence clashes at the site.
In other words, that Ir Amim statistic is the proof of the claim in the Crisis Group report.
Whether or not Prime Minister Netanyahu has indeed restricted access, and he has denied it, you cannot grasp what Hasson is doing, and to do so, a reader must take two things, at least, into account in assessing whether he/she will rely on Hasson:
a) without knowing how many days the Temple Mount was closed to Jews in 2015, mainly due to Muslims artificially creating more demands than previously for banning Jews on ‘holy’ days that didn’t exist in years past as well as more rioting which led police to ban Jews, Ir Amim’s insinuations based on the police data is meaningless as regards the supposed diplomatic kowtowing. Moreover, the fact is that the attempted assassination of Yehuda Glick is another factor that must be worked in.
b) since September, the number of all Jewish visitors to Jerusalem and especially the Old City has dropped due to Arab terror violence of the knives and car-rammings and that, of course, would affect the number of Jews ascending to the Temple Mount.
That Hasson does not mention those numbers is simply a matter of media bias. I do not know if he purposefully left them out or never even considered the other side of statistics, being a Ha’aretz reporter, but nevertheless, you, the media consumer, need be aware.
13.Revealed: Einstein blamed US for not stopping Nazis
US government of 1942 controlled by ‘fascist financiers,’ Einstein fumes in a never-before-seen letter. By Arutz Sheva staff First Publish: 4/8/2016, 12:52 PM
Einstein’s writings (illustration) – Albert Einstein archives, Hebrew University
Albert Einstein quietly fumed at the US for not doing more to stop the Nazis, a letter being auctioned later this month reveals.
“You can imagine how the new crimes committed by the Nazis in France make me suffer, crimes assisted to by the ‘fascist’ Vichy-traitors,” Einstein wrote, in a letter dated September 3, 1942. The letter was published in full Thursday by the Daily Mail.
He hesitated to approach Washington on the issue, however – saying the US government was “a government controlled to a large degree by financiers the mentality of whom is near to the fascist frame of mind.”
He further raged against the US’s support of Spanish dictator Francisco Franco.
Einstein lamented that his views put him in a difficult position, as he was “grateful having found and sought refuge and protection” from the Nazi regime in the US, and yet he wielded a great deal of influence, being considered one of the most important Americans at that time. While he believed that the US could be doing more to stop Nazi Germany, he ultimately declined from making his views public.
“If Hitler were not a lunatic he could easily have avoided the hostility of the Western powers,” he added. “That he is a lunatic is the sole advantage in the present sinister picture of the world.”
Einstein addressed the letter – which has never been revealed to the public until now – to Dr Frank Kingdon, President of Princeton University, who shared the Jewish scientist’s concerns.
The letter will go up for auction, to the tune of £30,000 ($42,246), on April 18.
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Revealed: Einstein blamed US for not stopping Nazis
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Dry Bones blog updates for winston@winstonglobal.org 14.Dry Bones by Ya’acov Kirschen “Out of Slavery”
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Dry Bones by Ya’acov Kirschen “Out of Slavery”15.How Bernie Sanders Sold His Soul to the Left by Daniel Greenfield April 7, 2016 Win or Lose, the Sanders campaign has its story. Bernie Sanders is the authentic candidate; the unapologetic progressive who pushes the Left’s agenda without worrying about offending anyone.
 Bernie doesn’t pander. Just look at him glaring into the camera, angrily delivering the same “smash capitalism” stump speech and then waiting for the local college students to take selfies with him. You may disagree with him. But he’s authentic, a curmudgeon who says whatever he really thinks.
And if you believe that, there’s a bridge in Bernie’s old Brooklyn neighborhood you can buy.
The Left is not an authentic political movement. It values dogma, not passion. What it sells is the appearance of passion and the hollow illusion of self-expression while pushing a rigid agenda.
The real story of the Bernie Sanders campaign is not that voters reward authenticity, but the illusion of it. Obama beat Hillary because he seemed more authentic. But he was just better at pandering to the Left while appearing to be natural and rehearsed in a way that you have to rehearse a lot to achieve.
Bernie Sanders has thrived by abandoning whatever made him authentic and becoming a robot reciting dogma in a voice borrowed from Larry David. Hillary Clinton never had a soul, but Bernie Sanders sold his in the hopes of beating her. And he got a bad deal on his soul because he can’t even seem to do that.
Originally Bernie Sanders was an independent who held unconventional views on some issues and wasn’t tied down to the Democratic Party and its widely loathed identity politics. Instead he could just do his old time Wall Street Socialist shtick and score populist points with angry voters without having to pander to every group and cause in the progressive politically correct spectrum of stupidity.
This was the Bernie Sanders who told Ezra Klein that he opposed open borders because it “says essentially there is no United States” and “would make everybody in America poorer.”
“You think we should open the borders and bring in a lot of low-wage workers, or do you think maybe we should try to get jobs for those kids?” Bernie barked.
Liberal heads exploded. Bernie tried to defend his views & then surrendered. A few months later, he was calling for amnesty for everyone, even illegal immigrants who had already been deported, without securing the borders & attacking Hillary Clinton for being too hard on illegal aliens.
Currently Bernie Sanders is calling for putting “a stop to the notion that the border must be secured before legalization can happen,” abandoning “boondoggle walls” and dismantling deportation and detention, and letting illegal aliens buy ObamaCare. That last one may be more of a punishment.
It took only a few months for Bernie Sanders to go from blasting open borders as a right-wing Wall Street conspiracy to becoming an open borders candidate. Which, by his own definition, would make him a Right-wing Wall Street tool of the capitalist conspiracy.
That’s how “authentic” Bernie really is.
The Bernie Sanders who attacked open borders at the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce was authentic. He’s gone. In his place is Bernie Sanders 2.0, an authentic robot spewing authentic progressive talking points about illegal immigration. That’s what an authentic sellout Bernie is.
What happened to Bernie Sanders on immigration also happened to him on a range of issues where he formerly deviated from the political orthodoxy of the Democrats. The deviations have been smoothed away. Hillary Clinton has been mocked for adopting Bernie Sanders’ positions, but Bernie adopted more of her positions than she did of his. He sold his soul to try and win.
When Hillary Clinton attacked Bernie Sanders from the Left on gun control, he reinvented his views. When Clinton’s political allies sent #BlackLivesMatter activists to harass him, he hemmed and hawed and then endorsed the worst of his new party’s identity politics pandering. When he was attacked for refusing to endorse reparations, he decided to endorse an apology & reparations.
Every time Hillary Clinton hit him on a position where he was out of step with political dogma, he scampered to adjust his views.
And it wasn’t just Hillary Clinton.
Bernie Sanders was constantly adjusting his views to atone for past violations of party dogma. Any authentically unconventional views in the past had to be denounced and disassociated from.
Bernie Sanders delivered an anti-Israel speech in Utah while refusing to come to the AIPAC convention. In Arizona, his campaign placed a member of the anti-Semitic hate group, Students for Justice in Palestine, behind him while he talked.
Bernie was telling the Left that he was disavowing the Jewish State. The authentic candidate was desperately pandering to Left-wing donors to keep funding his failed campaign. He was lashing out at Jews for “disportionately” fighting the Islamic terrorists who were killing their children. He was appealing to the Left-wing bigots who might have believed NPR’s Diane Rehm when she accused him of having dual citizenship in Israel. It was an authentically disgusting moment.
But his anti-Israel Utah speech was more than a shift, it was an apology. One of his more infuriating moments for the Left had been his attack on Hamas supporters at a town hall in Vermont. His Utah speech obsessively attacked Israel for having bombed Hamas terrorists in Gaza several years ago. It’s 2016 and Gaza isn’t a current issue. Even Obama and Kerry don’t dwell on it anymore.
Why did Bernie Sanders suddenly feel the need to unload on Israel over its last war with Hamas?
Why focus on Gaza rather than any more current issues and controversies? Bernie was disavowing his past half-hearted defense of Israel. He wasn’t just pandering, he was trying to retroactively rewrite his views as if they had never existed. His increasingly strident anti-Israel rhetoric escalated when he accused Israel of killing 10,000 innocent people in Gaza. By emphasizing Gaza, Bernie was trying to make the Left forget about his past sins of defending Israel’s campaign against Hamas.
We have always been at war with East-Asia. Bernie had always been on the Right side of the Left when it came to Israel or immigration or gun control… or anything else.
Israel may be the last piece of Bernie’s tattered soul that he has to sell to the Left for more money to keep going until Hillary’s super-delegates finally crush his miserable campaign. The Jewish State is the last shred of his “authenticity” that he has to give up to become an authentic left-wing hack.
But it’s not as if Bernie Sanders hasn’t done it before.
Back when Bernie Sanders was with the Liberty Union Party, he was militantly anti-Israel. Then when he went mainstream, he softened his views. Bernie was anti-Israel before he was pro-Israel before he was anti-Israel. The “authentic” candidate has spent his political life pandering to someone.
There was never really an authentic Bernie Sanders. Bernie was always a politician who reshaped his views when he needed to. Bernie’s supporters like to claim that he isn’t for sale. But Bernie Sanders sold his soul long ago. Now he’s auctioning off the used pieces of it a second and a third time for a few bucks.
The Left’s greatest lie is that it is a movement for rebels, non-conformists and independent thinkers. It’s impossible to be authentic and Left-wing. The Left values conformity above all else and harshly punishes even mild forms of dissent. On the Left, speaking freely is impossible. Even thinking freely is dangerous.
Bernie Sanders is selling the same illusion as Obama, that it’s possible to be Left-wing without sounding like an ideological robot. That you can be progressive without being Hillary Clinton. And that’s a myth.
Hillary Clinton is too clumsy to mask the rigid process by which Leftists adopt the party line. Obama and Bernie Sanders obscure the same creepy process with personality and style. But they are no different. They can’t be. There’s no room for dissent, independence and authenticity on the Left. Bernie Sanders sold his soul to be an authentic Leftist. Souls are the price of membership in the Left. How Bernie Sanders Sold His Soul to the Left by Daniel Greenfield |