Dear Family & Friends,

People are voting in America – as they have all over the world – absentee – for weeks. Here are some more vital informational articles. If you need more information before you vote, here it is – with a lot of variety in terms of topics.

I hope all of you who are registered to vote, will go & vote your conscience.

I did by absentee ballot. I hope it was received & counted.

I just watched “All the Presidents’ Men” with Robert Redford & Dustin Hoffman as Bob Woodward & Carl Bernstein when they were investigating, writing & printing the story of the Watergate Break-In, with all the espionage, sabotage & dirty dealing. Without ‘social media’, without ‘Google’, YouTubes, etc. – without all the technology we use today, Woodward & Bernstein really did all that investigating, proving with confirmations from various sources that Ben Bradley editor of The Washington Post, played by Jason Robards.

In the past six weeks or so, I’ve read & viewed some ugly, vile ‘stuff’ against both of the candidates. I haven’t passed it on to my readers because ‘this is a family Website’. I don’t want to dirty your minds & thoughts with some of what I’ve read, viewed & heard.

As the actor who plays The Washington Post, Ben Bradlee says to Woodward & Bernstein: “Nothing’s riding on this except the First Amendment, Freedom of the Press, & the future of this country.” So, read between the lines, try to see the truths & vote your conscience.

Now I’m watching Robin Williams as a talk-show comic who becomes a Presidential candidate in “Man of the Year”. I really think Donald Trump must have inhaled this movie. It’s great theater & truth-in-advertising, as well as truly funny & meaningful for our times.

I hope we get a really good President, who hires really good, very smart & honest staff. Remember, tomorrow night this election will be over & we’ll have to go back to work on our real heart-felt issues. So, have a brief rest & then back to work.

We have a lovely, silvery half moon here in Jerusalem, Israel.

All the very best, Gail/Geula/Savta/Savta x 2/Mom

Live results: 2016 U.S. presidential election 11/9/16 US & Canada Arutz Sheva with live updates as polls close in the U.S. presidential election.

1.Lame-duck Obama’s last hurrah by Ruthie Blum

2.Arlene Kushner “From Israel: Very Last Word on the Campaign”

3.Trump Deepens Commitment to Israel from Unity Coalition for Israel

4.16-POINT PLAN WAS POSTED ON WED. NOV. 2 BY MEDIUM PUBLISHING.

5.Pro-Israel Organizations Hold Candidates Accountable for Stance on US Embassy in Israel.

6.Balfour Declaration, November 2016 by Richard Kemp

7.America first? Things the next president must realize by Prof. Louis René Beres

8.The $38 Billion “Understanding” – CONGRESS & U.S. AID TO ISRAEL

9.Israeli Defense Sector Breathes Easier After New U.S. Aid Pact

10.Arlene Kushner “From Israel: The Fate of America” Nov. 6, 2016

2.Arlene Kushner “From Israel: Very Last Word on the Campaign” Nov. 7, 2016

OK, so I said yesterday that my posting was the last before the election. And now here I am again. With good reason.

Most importantly, I want to share the link to Trump’s fantastic video finale for the campaign. I urge you to view it and then consider sending it far and wide. Today. Without delay. Put it on Facebook and share it with your lists.

https://www.youtube.com/shared?ci=Lf1psqyg0GE

[GAIL SEZ: THIS IS A POWERFUL ELECTION YOU TUBE SPEECH BY DONALD TRUMP]

But then a comment about Comey’s announcement yesterday that the FBI had completed its examination of the emails on the Weiner laptop. Nothing was found, he declared, that would warrant a change in his earlier recommendation that no charges should be brought against Clinton for mishandling of emails.

Precipitous conclusion, do you think? So timely before election day. Never mind that very shortly before this announcement it was being said by FBI personnel that it would take many days to complete the email examination. There were 650,000 emails found, some tens of thousands of which were said linked to the Clinton server.

I wonder if the very convenient timing of the announcement, the precipitousness with which the investigation was wrapped up, will end up convincing much of the electorate that it was all legit. I think Comey, who has handled things badly from the get-go, did what he had to do (or perceived that he had to do) under the circumstances. And there it sits.

I do not believe we have heard the last on this. Just as conscientious FBI investigators came forward before, I suspect they will again. Trump thinks so too. At a rally yesterday, he said:

“Hillary Clinton is guilty. She knows it, The FBI knows it. The people know it.” Now it is up to “the American people to deliver justice at the ballot box on November 8.”

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/219892

There is still so much out there: The on-going investigation of the Clinton Foundation (with the latest news being that Foundation “charity” funds apparently paid for Chelsea Clinton’s wedding); the Wikileaks. And how about this, which broke yesterday:

“As secretary of state, Hillary Clinton routinely asked her maid to print out sensitive government e-mails and documents — including ones containing classified information — from her house in Washington, DC, e-mails and FBI memos show. But the housekeeper lacked the security clearance to handle such material.”

http://nypost.com/2016/11/06/clinton-directed-her-maid-to-print-out-classified-materials/

And so, please, do not interpret the Comey announcement yesterday as proof that Clinton is innocent of wrong-doing. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Tomorrow is election day. Get out and vote!

© Arlene Kushner. This material is produced by Arlene Kushner, functioning as an independent journalist. Permission is granted for it to be reproduced only with proper attribution. If it is reproduced and emphasis is added, the fact that it has been added must be noted. See my website at www.arlenefromisrael.info Contact Arlene atakushner18@gmail.com

In the final days before election, Republican Presidential candidate, Donald Trump, has deepened his connection to Israel, personally and politically, in several significant moves.

On Wednesday, Trump signed on a letter presented by two major pro-Israel Christian organizations, which calls for moving the US Embassy to Jerusalem. The letter, posted online as a petition and organized by the American Christian Leaders for Israel (ACLI) and the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem (ICEJ), called for the following commitments:

1. Implement the Jerusalem Embassy Act of 1995 and relocate the US Embassy in Israel to its capital city of Jerusalem.

2. Renew and strengthen the US’s Memorandum of Understanding to fund Israel’s growing security needs.

3. Combat any efforts at the local, state, or federal level to boycott, divest from, or sanction Israel.

4. Monitor Iran’s ongoing violations of sanctions and to toughen current sanctions as well as impose new ones as necessary.

5. Oppose any imposed solutions to the Palestinian conflict on Israel by outside parties, including the United Nations Security Council.

Since it was posted, approximately 650 Christian leaders have signed the letter, and over 40,000 people have signed the online petition.

According to ICEJ, Clinton has yet to respond to the letter.

A 16-point plan was posted on Wednesday on the Medium publishing platform by Trump’s Israel advisers, David Friedman and Jason Dov Greenblatt. The plan states a strong commitment to the friendship between Israel and the US, and promises that, if elected, Trump will move the US Embassy to Jerusalem, fight the Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS) movement on campus, oppose any imposed Palestinian-Israeli solution that are not a result of direct negotiations, oppose anti-Israel efforts in the UN, and prevent Iranian non-compliance with their nuclear agreements and their support of international terrorism.

Perhaps even more telling is his personal connection to the Holy Land and the God of Abraham. Last week, Trump sent a hand-written note via David Faiman, an adviser, who will place it in the Kotel (the Western Wall). His supplication for divine aid reportedly comes after consulting with his Jewish daughter, Ivanka. The note read:

“May you bless the United States, our armed forces and our allies. May your guiding hand protect and strengthen our great nation.”

4.16-POINT PLAN WAS POSTED ON WEDNESDAY NOV. 2 BY MEDIUM PUBLISHING.

Jason D. Greenblatt EVP/Chief Legal Officer of The Trump Organization, co-chairman of Mr. Trump’s Israel Advisory Committee & Co-Founder of InspireConversation.com

Joint Statement from Jason Dov Greenblatt and David Friedman, Co-Chairmen of the Israel Advisory Committee to Donald J. Trump

It has been an exhilarating election cycle. Approximately seven months ago, we were blessed to have been tapped by Donald J. Trump to be his top advisors with respect to the State of Israel. We have been fortunate to work with a talented team of people & have put together the below positions.

Each of these positions have been discussed with Mr. Trump and the Trump campaign, and most have been stated, in one form or another, by Mr. Trump in various interviews or speeches given by him or on his social media accounts. For those of you who are true friends of the State of Israel, and for those of you who believe that the State of Israel and the United States of America have an unbreakable friendship, we urge you to read the below. We would like to express our gratitude to those individuals who have helped us over the past few months?—?we truly appreciate your efforts, friendship and guidance. We would also like to express our gratitude to our friend, a great friend of the State of Israel, Donald J. Trump, who gave us the tremendous opportunity to serve in this capacity.

May God bless the United States of America and the State of Israel.

16-POINT PLAN WED. NOV. 2, 2016 by Israel Advisory Committee to Donald J. Trump

1. The unbreakable bond between the United States and Israel is based upon shared values of democracy, freedom of speech, respect for minorities, cherishing life, and the opportunity for all citizens to pursue their dreams.

2. Israel is the state of the Jewish people, who have lived in that land for 3,500 years. The State of Israel was founded with courage and determination by great men and women against enormous odds and is an inspiration to people everywhere who value freedom and human dignity.

3. Israel is a staunch ally of the U.S. and a key partner in the global war against Islamic Jihadism. Military cooperation and coordination between Israel and the U.S. must continue to grow.

4. The American people value our close friendship and alliance with Israel?—?culturally, religiously, & politically. While other nations required U.S. troops to defend them, Israelis have always defended their own country by themselves & only ask for military equipment assistance & diplomatic support to do so. The U.S. doesn’t need to nation-build in Israel or send troops to defend Israel.

5. The Memorandum of Understanding signed by the American and Israeli Governments is a good first step, but there is much more to be done. A Trump Administration will ensure that Israel receives maximum military, strategic and tactical cooperation from the United States, and the MOU will not limit the support that we give. Further, Congress will not be limited to give support greater than that provided by the MOU if it chooses to do so. Israel and the United States benefit tremendously from what each country brings to the table?—?the relationship is a two way street.

6.The U.S. should veto any United Nations votes that unfairly single out Israel and will work in international institutions and forums, including in our relations with the European Union, to oppose efforts to delegitimize Israel, impose discriminatory double standards against Israel, or to impose special labeling requirements on Israeli products or boycotts on Israeli goods.

7.The U.S. should cut off funds for the UN Human Rights Council, a body dominated by countries presently run by dictatorships that seems solely devoted to slandering the Jewish State. UNESCO’s attempt to disconnect the State of Israel from Jerusalem is a one-sided attempt to ignore Israel’s 3,000-year bond to its capital city & is further evidence of the enormous anti-Israel bias of the UN.

8. The U.S. should view the effort to boycott, divest from, and sanction (BDS) Israel as inherently anti-Semitic and take strong measures, both diplomatic and legislative, to thwart actions that are intended to limit commercial relations with Israel, or persons or entities doing business in Israeli areas, in a discriminatory manner. The BDS movement is just another attempt by the Palestinians to avoid having to commit to a peaceful co-existence with Israel. The false notion that Israel is an occupier should be rejected.

9. The Trump administration will ask the Justice Department to investigate coordinated attempts on college campuses to intimidate students who support Israel. 10. A two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinians appears impossible as long as the Palestinians are unwilling to renounce violence against Israel or recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state. Additionally, the Palestinians are divided between PA rule in the West Bank and Hamas rule in Gaza so there is not a united Palestinian people who could control a second state. Hamas is a US-designated terrorist organization that actively seeks Israel’s destruction. We will seek to assist the Israelis and the Palestinians in reaching a comprehensive and lasting peace, to be freely and fairly negotiated between those living in the region.

11. The Palestinian leadership, including the PA, has undermined any chance for peace with Israel by raising generations of Palestinian children on an educational program of hatred of Israel and Jews. The larger Palestinian society is regularly taught such hatred on Palestinian television, in the Palestinian press, in entertainment media, and in political and religious communications. The two major Palestinian political parties?—?Hamas and Fatah?—?regularly promote anti-Semitism and jihad.

12. The U.S. cannot support the creation of a new state where terrorism is financially incentivized, terrorists are celebrated by political parties and government institutions & the corrupt diversion of foreign aid is rampant. The U.S. should not support the creation of a state that forbids the presence of Christian or Jewish citizens, or that discriminates against people on the basis of religion. 13.The U.S. should support direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians without preconditions, and will oppose all Palestinian, European and other efforts to bypass direct negotiations between parties in favor of an imposed settlement. Any solutions imposed on Israel by outside parties including by the United Nations Security Council, should be opposed. We support Israel’s right and obligation to defend itself against terror attacks upon its people and against alternative forms of warfare being waged upon it legally, economically, culturally, and otherwise. 14.Israel’s maintenance of defensible borders that preserve peace and promote stability in the region is a necessity. Pressure should not be put on Israel to withdraw to borders that make attacks and conflict more likely.

15. The U.S. will recognize Jerusalem as the eternal and indivisible capital of the Jewish state and Mr. Trump’s Administration will move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem.

16. Despite the Iran Nuclear deal in 2015, the U.S. State Department recently designated Iran, yet again, as the leading state sponsor of terrorism?—?putting the Middle East particularly, but the whole world at risk by financing, arming, and training terrorist groups operating around the world including Hamas, Hezbollah, and forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. The U.S. must counteract Iran’s ongoing violations of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action regarding Iran’s quest for nuclear weapons and their noncompliance with past and present sanctions, as well as the agreements they signed, and implement tough, new sanctions when needed to protect the world and Iran’s neighbors from its continuing nuclear and non-nuclear threats.

Jason D. Greenblatt, EVP/Chief Legal Officer of The Trump Organization, co-chairman of Mr. Trump’s Israel Advisory Committee & Co-Founder of InspireConversation.com

Final Days of US Presidential Race Sees Pro-Israel Organizations Holding Candidates Accountable for Stance on US Embassy in Israel.

In light of differences between the US Candidates Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, one issue seems to be drawing attention during the few remaining days of the race. A 25-year advocacy group uniting Christians and Jews for Israel, the Unity Coalition for Israel (UCI), has issued an urgent action calling the two candidates to account regarding the Jerusalem Embassy Act. The 1995 Act, US Law 104-45, was to be enacted by May of 1999. The law calls for the move of the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Israel’s capital, Jerusalem.

Esther Levens, founder of UCI, states, “Due to the increasing angst around the world regarding the rising terrorist threats of ISIS and other Islamist networks, UCI is taking action to implore the US Candidates to fulfill the Jerusalem Embassy Act of 1995 and finally move the US Embassy to its rightful place in Israel’s capital city, Jerusalem. This move will provide a necessary show of solidarity with Israel, the world’s strongest democratic ally for freedom in the Middle East. Our action has challenged the US presidential candidates to take a clear stand on the issue.”

On March 21, 2016, at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) Convention, Donald Trump spoke passionately to Jewish attendees of his clear intention to accomplish this long-awaited move of the US Embassy to Jerusalem, Israel’s eternal capital city. Hillary Clinton, who also spoke at the event, made no mention of doing so, nor did she affirm her belief that Jerusalem is, indeed, Israel’s capital.

In an effort similar to UCI’s Action Alert, the International Christian Embassy of Jerusalem (ICEJ) and the American Christian Leaders for Israel (ACLI), issued a letter to the candidates, Mr. Trump and Mrs. Clinton, calling for the move of the US Embassy in the first of 5 points:

1. Recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and move the US Embassy there
2. Renew the ten-year Memorandum of Understanding between the US and Israel which

provides aid in response to Israel’s growing security needs
3. Oppose the global Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel
4. Sanction Iran’s relentless actions as the world’s leading sponsor of terror
5. Reject third party solutions to the Israeli – Palestinian conflict not negotiated by the two parties

Donald Trump replied immediately in agreement to the principles listed. Hillary Clinton has not yet responded.

Susan Michaels, US Director of the ICEJ, comments regarding the letter, “The policies Mr. Trump has agreed to will enhance Israel’s standing in the world and directly benefit the United States in security, innovation, technology, and intelligence.”

Ms. Levens adds, “UCI supports the ICEJ/ACLI letter of principles and lauds Mr. Trump for his affirmation of its truths. Our action specifically challenges candidate Hillary Clinton to affirm the Jerusalem Embassy Act and the subsequent move of the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to the Israeli capital, Jerusalem. We are still awaiting a response from Mrs. Clinton.”

For more information on the UCI Action Alert and a companion video, “Jerusalem: a Wedge Issue,” visit uc4i.org/move.

Contact: Esther Levens – voices@unitycoalitionforisrael.org – 913-648-0022

This week we enter the centenary year of the Balfour Declaration. This document, signed on November 2, 1917 by the British Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour, was the first recognition by one of the world’s great powers — in fact at the time the greatest power in the world — of the right of the Jewish people to their national homeland in Palestine.

It was the single most significant step taken in restoring Jewish self-determination in their historic territories. Under the San Remo Resolution 3 years later, the Balfour Declaration was enshrined in international law, leading inexorably to the 1947 UN partition plan & ultimately to the proclamation of the State of Israel by David Ben Gurion on May 14, 1948.

As Britain, Israel and the free world begin to mark this monumental anniversary, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas demands an apology from the UK.

The man whose constitutional tenure as Palestinian leader expired seven years ago, yet remains in place. The man who raised funds for the 1972 massacre in Munich of 11 Israeli Olympic athletes. The man who misused millions of dollars of international aid intended for the welfare of his people. The man who dismissed as a “fantastic lie” the six million Jews who perished in the Holocaust.

This man demands an apology. Of course he does. In demanding that Britain apologise for a 99-year-old statement supporting a national home for the Jewish people, he exposes his true position, and the true position of all factions of the Palestinian leadership: that the Jewish people have no right to a national home; the Jewish State has no right to exist. According to Abbas, Palestine, from the River Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea, belongs to the Arabs and only to the Arabs.

At a dinner held by the Zionist Federation in London on April 12, 1931, Sir Herbert Samuel, British High Commissioner in Palestine from 1920 to 1925 and the first Jew to govern the historic land of Israel in 2,000 years, said: “In time the Arabs will come to appreciate and respect the Jewish [standpoint]”.

Unfortunately, as Abbas’s demands demonstrate only too clearly, he could not have been more wrong. It is sometimes claimed that Arab violence towards the Jews began with the Balfour Declaration, which created in their minds a feeling of betrayal by the British and an apprehension of Arab subjugation under Jewish governance.

This ignores the murder and massacre of Jews by Arabs in the Middle East, including in Jaffa and Jerusalem, throughout the 19^th Century and in the 20^th Century in the years before 1917 — just because they were Jews.

Arab Jew-hatred certainly did not start with Balfour. But it did intensify after Balfour. It was this intensification, with its accompanying slaughter, revolt and rioting against both British and Jews that caused Britain to falter and fail over her 1917 declaration of support for a Jewish national homeland. It caused the British government to introduce White Papers in 1922 and 1939 that sought to appease Arab violence and resistance by imposing restrictions on Jewish immigration into Palestine and the development of the millennia-old Jewish presence in their historic homeland.

It caused Britain to deny Jewish immigration into Palestine even as Jews were being butchered in the millions in Europe. It even led Britain to send survivors of Auschwitz back to the lair of the Nazi murderers. And it caused Britain to behave in a way that precipitated agonizing Jewish violence against the British in Palestine in the 1940s, when it was the last thing the Jews wanted to do.

It caused Britain to abstain from the 1947 UN General Assembly resolution that brought about the re-establishment of the Jewish state in 1948. And even to appoint a British general — Sir John Glubb — to lead the Arab Legion’s invasion of Israel immediately afterwards.

It has caused Britain up to the present day to sometimes fail to condemn Arab aggression against Israelis, and to find excuses for their violence. All in the name of appeasing the Arabs and their supporters in the Muslim world and even at home.

Despite all of this, with Britain sometimes sinking into moral weakness over its subsequent failure to support the state that it incubated, the country can be intensely proud that Britain alone embraced Zionism in 1917. And it was the blood of many thousands of British, Australian and New Zealand soldiers that created the conditions that made the modern-day State of Israel a possibility.

These men fought and died in the Palestine campaign to defeat the Ottoman Empire that had occupied the territory for centuries. One month after the Balfour Declaration, on December 7^th, the British Empire forces under General Allenby drove the Ottomans from Jerusalem. The day the last Turk left the Holy City was the first day of Hanukkah, the celebration of the Maccabean liberation of that city 2,000 years earlier.

Those soldiers were above all the instrument of the will of one of the greatest Prime Ministers in British history: David Lloyd George. There are many arguments about the motives for his actions over Palestine. But not only was he the true motivating force behind the Balfour Declaration; he also ordered and drove the defeat of the Ottomans in Palestine that breathed life into his Foreign Secretary’s words to the Zionist Federation.

Thirteen years later, at the Zionist Federation dinner in 1931, mentioned earlier, David Lloyd George was present as guest of honour. He said:

“The Jews surely have a special claim on [Palestine]. They are the only people who have made a success of it during the past 3,000 years. They are the only people who have made its name immortal, and as a race, they have no other home. This was their first; this has been their only home; they have no other home. They found no home in Egypt or in Babylon. Since their long exile they have found no home as a people in any other land, and this is the time and opportunity for enabling them once more to recreate their lives as a separate people in their old home and to make their contribution to humanity as a separate people, having a habitation in the land which inspired their forefathers. Later on it might be too late.”

Later on it might be too late. These prophetic words became a devastating reality for millions of Jews in the years to come. Within five years, the Arab Revolt had begun, in protest at the influx of Jews into Palestine, desperate to get out of Europe before it was indeed too late. The Arab Revolt in turn led to the White Paper of 1939, severely curtailing Jewish immigration into Palestine at their hour of greatest need, as the British government attempted to appease the Arabs.

The White Paper was described by Lloyd George in Parliament as “an act of perfidy” and by the Manchester Guardian as “a death sentence on tens of thousands of Central European Jews.” The words of the Peel Commission, which investigated the Arab unrest, apply as much today as they did in 1937 when they were written: “The hatred of the Arab politician for the Jewish national home has never been concealed and… it has now permeated the Arab population as a whole.”

The Arabs rejected the British proposals for partition of the land in the 1930s and again rejected the 1947 UN partition plan. Since then they have had numerous opportunities for the creation of a Palestinian state. All have been rejected. They have preferred to attempt Israel’s annihilation by terrorism and war, rather than find an opportunity to live side by side in peace.

Depending on his audience, Palestinian Authority (PA) President Abbas claims to desire a two-state solution. But his actions speak louder. How can it be possible to bring about peace with a country or a people that you constantly vilify and attack? Hatred of Jews and denial of their rights permeate PA speeches, TV shows, school-books, newspapers and magazines. Murderous terrorists are glorified by naming football teams and sports stadiums after them. They are incentivised to violence by salaries and payments to their families — funded of course by the American and European taxpayer. Everywhere there is incitement to hate. Only a few days ago we saw the consequences of failure to hate for four hapless Palestinians who dared to fraternise with the “Zionist enemy” when they entered the Mayor of Efrat’s succah.

As we know only too well, the violent attacks against Jews, seen so frequently in the 19^th and early 20^th Centuries, continue unabated to this day. The latest just last week when three Israeli soldiers were shot and wounded by an Arab gunman near the Jewish town of Beit El. In recent weeks, we have seen the Palestinian Authority’s efforts to expunge Jews and Judaism from any connection with their undeniable history and holy places via grotesque and nonsensical resolutions at UNESCO.

Nothing has changed in the Arabs’ attitudes and actions from Balfour’s day to our own. Yet we have seen a miraculous and untold transformation over those 99 years within the State of Israel. Even as far back as that dinner in 1931, years before the re-creation of the state, Lloyd George was able to declare: “Zionism has brought to an old land, a renowned but a ruined old land, new wealth, new energy, new purpose, new initiative, new intelligence, a new devotion and a new hope. Zionism has not finished its task, far from it, but it has already accomplished so much as to demonstrate that the land flowing with milk and honey was no baseless legend.”

Even he would be astonished to see just how much further Israel has ascended in the intervening 85 years. But despite Israel’s seemingly boundless progress, she remains under attack not just from the Arabs of the Middle East but also in the West, in Europe and in the UK.

Despite a myriad of their own dire problems and the ongoing bloodbath in the Arab world, the Europeans, led by the French, seem hell-bent on trying to impose the so-called 1967 borders on Israel through the UN Security Council — lines described by legendary Israeli Foreign Minister Abba Eban as the “Auschwitz borders.”

Flying in the face of the long-standing US bipartisan policy of rejecting these borders, there is increasing concern that President Obama’s parting shot at Israel might be to either endorse such a resolution or fail to veto it. Such actions would have incalculable consequences — not least a flare-up in violence and the prospect of global sanctions against Israel, which would rightly be unable to accept such a resolution.

In the home of the Balfour Declaration the pressure is also on. Increasing anti-Semitic abuse is directed against the Jewish community in the UK and against those who dare to support the State of Israel, including politicians. Abuse aimed of course at undermining their support and isolating the Jewish State.

Only a few days ago we saw despicable scenes of anti-Semitic hatred and lies at an event in the House of Lords in support of Abbas’s absurd demand that we apologise for Balfour. In the same week, we witnessed another vicious outbreak of anti-Semitic abuse at University College London, where Jewish students were forced to seek refuge in the face of an aggressive effort to shut down their freedom of speech by so-called supporters of Palestine.

Even 99 years after the world-changing Balfour Declaration, we still have our work cut out for us in supporting the Zionist project, which owes so much to the unequalled historic backing of Great Britain.

But as Lloyd George said of this great venture: “Can you recall any movement worth prosecuting that has not encountered obstacles? Can you recall one persevered in with courage and faith where such obstacles have not been overcome in the end?”

David Lloyd George, as in so much else, was of course right. And the words of this Welshman who saw so much in common between his own tiny country and the homeland of the Jews, whose nonconformist upbringing gave him a feeling of familiarity with the Holy Land, are words that should guide those of us who support the State of Israel today: “This Mandate [for the Jewish national home] must be carried out not nervously and apologetically but firmly and fearlessly.”

Colonel Richard Kemp was Commander of British Forces in Afghanistan. He served in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, the Balkans and Northern Ireland and was head of the international terrorism team for the UK Joint Intelligence Committee. Follow Richard Kemp on Twitter

© 2016 Gatestone Institute. All rights reserved.

7.America first? Things the next president must realize by Prof. Louis René Beres, 06/11/16

Any US president must understand that the state of America’s union can never be any better than the state of the wider world – & also realize that the state of our world must depend substantially on what happens inside the U.S.

Prof. Louis René Beres, (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.

As America’s distressing election season draws to its long-awaited conclusion, the country has yet to understand something of very great importance. It is that the desired state of America’s national union can never be improved in determined planetary isolation, or in an endlessly primal global competition. Instead, as Americans still need to learn, the national interest is intimately and irrevocably intertwined with a much wider human interest.

“America First” makes absolutely no logical or pragmatic sense. Always, Americans, both individually and collectively, must ultimately depend upon a willingness to identify more broadly as fully interrelated citizens of a single planet. Reciprocally, it should also be acknowledged, the fate of others on this one earth will always be more-or-less substantially impacted by whatever happens within America’s borders.

The core “lesson” here must become clear and transnational. To help rescue an imperiled planet, and America in particular, the next president will have to look beyond politics, and also beyond dealing incessantly piecemeal with the next expected war or terror threat. More precisely, this new

leader will have to recognize that American well-being and progress are inextricably linked with the condition of other nations & peoples, although not always in readily decipherable or even narrowly economic terms.

It will be a suitable moment to recall the essentially “Buddhist” wisdom of Jesuit philosopher, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (The Phenomenon of Man): “The egocentric ideal of a future reserved for those who have managed to attain egoistically the extremity of `everyone for himself’ is false and against nature. No element can move and grow except with and by all the others with itself.”

At their very deepest level, war, terror, and genocide are not merely the unwelcome product of ordinary politics gone awry. Rather, they stem from the unbearable apprehensions and loneliness of individual human beings. Normally unable to find either meaning or security outside of groups, literally billions of individuals across the globe will often stop at nothing just to acquire comfortingly recognizable membership in a suitable crowd.

Whether it is a nation, a social organization, a terrorist band, or a new political movement, the crowd tempts all-too-many with the promised succor of group communion. Inevitably, this is its very great and possibly incomparable attraction. Although rarely identified or understood, it is the generally frantic search to belong that most assiduously shapes both national and human affairs.

This search, to apply a term drawn from Swiss psychologist Carl G. Jung’s The Undiscovered Self, effectively represents “the sum total of individual souls seeking redemption.” Moreover, the most tangible expressions of our incessant human search for rescue in groups can be found in the foundational legal principles of sovereignty and self-determination. But, significantly, the “self” in such hegemonic jurisprudence always refers to entire peoples, and never to singular individuals. As is evident to everyone who can read and recall human history, the ironic result of such backward thinking is all too often a measureless orgy of mass killing.

We still see entirely too much of this lethal thinking today in the conspicuously lascivious crimes underway in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, and elsewhere.

Divided into thousands of hostile tribes, almost two hundred of which are called nation-states, many human beings still find it easy or distinctly pleasing to slay “others.” As for any remediating empathy, it is typically reserved almost exclusively for those who live within one’s own expressly delineated tribe. It follows that any expansion of empathy to include “outsiders” is a genuinely basic condition of authentic peace and global union, and that without such an expansion our species will remain utterly dedicated to its own incremental debasement and eventual disappearance.

Understanding this wisdom must soon become an indispensable corrective to the plainly literal political nonsense of “America First,” a term that is also eerily reminiscent of “Deutschland uber alles.”

But what must Americans actually do to encourage wider empathy, and to foster deeply caring feelings between as well as within tribes? How can an incoming president improve the state of our world, so as to correspondingly ensure a viable and prosperous future for the American union? These are not easy questions.

Sadly, the essential expansion of empathy for the many could literally be “dreadful,” possibly improving human community, but then only at the intolerable cost of private sanity. This is because we humans are designed with particular and largely impermeable boundaries of feeling. Were it otherwise, an extended range of compassion toward others would quickly bring about our own total emotional collapse.

A paradox arises. Planning seriously for national and international survival, Americans must first accept a very unorthodox understanding: It is that a widening circle of human compassion is both indispensable to civilizational survival, and also a potential source of insufferable private anguish.

We can learn here from certain ancient Jewish traditions. According to Talmudic thought, the world rests upon thirty-six just men – the Lamed-Vov. Only because of their own “heavy lifting,” only because of their own unimaginable suffering, can the rest of us be allowed to endure.

There are many meanings to this wonderful tradition, but only one that is indisputably fundamental. A whole world of just men (and women) is clearly impossible. It is, then, because ordinary individuals simply cannot bear the torments of so many others that God has so generously created the Lamed-Vov.

How shall human union and American politics now deal with a requirement for global civilization that is simultaneously essential and unbearable? Newly informed that empathy for the many is a precondition of a decent world union, what can create such empathy without producing intolerable emotional pain? In essence, how can the next U.S, president correctly deal with the ongoing and still-multiplying expressions of war, terrorism, and genocide?

The answer can never be found in ordinary political speeches and programs, especially in the shallow rhetoric and empty witticisms of the American electoral campaign. It is discoverable, rather, only in a resolute detachment of all individuals from certain lethally competitive tribes, and from certain other collective “selves.” In the final analysis, a more perfect union, both national and international, must lie in a determined replacement of “civilization” with what Teilhard de Chardin calls “planetization.”

Unassailably, the world is a system.[1] Above all else, the incoming U.S. president must finally understand that the state of America’s national union can never be any better than the state of the wider world. He or she will also need to realize that the state of our world must depend substantially on what happens inside the United States. In fully acknowledging this significantly misunderstood mutuality, this immutable reciprocity, the overarching common presidential objective must always be the dignity of each and every individual human being.

It will, of course, be easy to dismiss any such ethereal recommendation as silly or fanciful, but in actuality, there could never be any greater American naiveté than continuing with the patently false extremity of “everyone for himself” in world politics.

LOUIS RENÉ BERES (Ph.D. Princeton 1971) is the author of many books and articles dealing with literature, art, philosophy, international relations, and international law. He was born in Zürich, Switzerland, at the end of World War II, the only son of Viennese Holocaust refugees.

8.The $38 Billion “Understanding”- CONGRESS & U.S. AID TO ISRAEL

Are ­Netanyahu’s Strong Beliefs Worth $7 Billion? By Amos Harel

Washington Report on Middle East Affairs

The first U.S. F-16i jet fighter to be delivered to Israel lands at the Ramon Air Force Base in the Negev desert, Feb. 19, 2004. That year Israel received $2.04 billion in U.S. military aid, along with $720 million in economic aid. The recently signed $38 billion memorandum of understanding with Israel calls for $3.8 billion in annual U.S. aid—all of it military. (DAVID SILVERMAN/GETTY IMAGES)

EVEN IN THE flexible world of Israeli politics, it’s been a while since there was such a gap between reality and how the Prime Minister’s Office was spinning reality. In press statements and talking points, the military aid agreement with the United States is being portrayed as an unprecedented achievement. “The biggest aid package ever,” we keep hearing.

But the chasm between the headlines and the real numbers is huge. Nominally, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and his spokespeople are right. The agreement includes a commitment for $38 billion in aid over a decade, higher than the $31 billion in the current deal that ends in 2018.

But it’s doubtful that this is a reliable comparison. At the insistence of the Obama administration, the new agreement is “all-inclusive”—Israel has committed not to go behind the administration’s back to Congress to request more money.

Such additions, initiated by Congress and sometimes by the administration itself, have been awarded to Israel to fill the gaps caused by the 2014 Gaza war, to help develop technology to locate Hamas’ terror tunnels, and especially to expedite the development and procurement of missile-interception systems. According to the U.S. Missile Defense Agency, Israel received $729 million for these purposes in 2014 and $620 million last year; according to Israeli sources, this number will come to $600 million in 2016.

In other words, the real upgrade in the new “unprecedented” agreement is around $100 million to $200 million annually compared with recent years, and that’s without considering inflation; neither the old nor new agreements account for erosions in purchasing power.

But that’s small change compared with the $7 billion that many claim Netanyahu lost for Israel due to his performance on the Iranian nuclear agreement, his difficult relationship with President Barack Obama and the repeated delays in sealing the new agreement.

As the Israeli opposition parties & the media put it, this is the price of Netanyahu’s address to Congress against the nuclear agreement March 2015 despite the administration’s pleas not to do so.

But defense officials have told Ha’aretz that the damage was actually done later. They say that even after the signing of the Vienna accord with Iran in July last year, agreements in principle had been reached between U.S. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter and his Israeli counterpart at the time, Moshe Ya’alon, on an aid package totaling $45 billion for the decade.

Netanyahu, however, insisted on one last effort to manipulate Congress against Obama & the deal in Sept. That failed attempt was apparently the point where the White House lost patience.

In his defense, the prime minister and his people say that taking a principled stand against the Vienna agreement was important from both an historical and a practical perspective. The move persuaded Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states that Israel was standing her ground, even at the cost of a clash with a United States that was displaying a defeatist, conciliatory approach to Iran, which backs insurgencies and terror all over the region. The value of a principled approach is hard to quantify, but is it really worth $7 billion?

To the question marks surrounding the aid package we must add another key issue. Under pressure from the administration, the option of using up to a quarter of the aid money to buy equipment from Israeli defense companies will be gradually phased out. Israel will get a gradual phase-out; it will be six years before such purchases must end.

This bad news isn’t directly connected to the argument over Iran or the lack of chemistry between Netanyahu and Obama. The administration was responding to pressure from U.S. arms makers, which have lost huge contracts because of budget cuts & which are seeking new markets abroad. But they’ve found they’ve had a hard time competing with Israeli firms buoyed by U.S. aid.

Israelis who visited Washington earlier this year got the impression that this change to the agreement was raised by the administration only in March or April. This means that if Israel hadn’t acted as if it had all the time in the world, it might have been able to sign the agreement before the cancellation of the buy-in-Israel provision came up. (This is exactly what administration officials, including Vice President Joe Biden, had urged Israel to do.)

In the long term, thousands of Israeli jobs will be lost. The Israeli companies have already said they will have to start producing in the United States, in cooperation with local companies, to be able to keep a portion of the aid.

The man representing Israel at the signing ceremony in Washington was Jacob Nagel, the acting national security adviser and the second person to refuse a permanent appointment to the job, which has been vacant since the beginning of the year. It seems that given the tension between Obama and Netanyahu, the U.S. president is doing the minimum. He raised the aid level in a way that lets him claim that it’s the highest aid package ever (which is important both for the White House and the Democrats ahead of the November election). Still, Obama is signing the agreement with Netanyahu the way a recalcitrant husband finally grants his wife a divorce: on condition they no longer have to spend any time in each other’s presence.

While it’s all coincidental, of course, the death of former President Shimon Peres will let the Prime Minister’s Office skirt the aid-package issue quickly and deal with the next storm to erupt. The damage and gaps in the agreement, however, will be with us for years to come.

Copyright © Ha’aretz Daily Newspaper Ltd. All rights reserved.

9.Israeli Defense Sector Breathes Easier After New U.S. Aid Pact By Ora Coren

Israel’s defense industry breathed a sigh of relief Thursday after the new and enlarged U.S. military aid package showed that allowances for Israeli spending at home won’t decline until year 6 of the 10-year agreement.

On Sept. 14, Israeli and U.S. officials signed the deal that boosts annual aid starting in 2018 to $3.8 billion, from $3.1 billion under the current agreement.

While Israel’s Defense Ministry is looking forward to the extra largesse, Israeli defense companies feared they would be the big losers because Washington insisted that as a condition for the heftier aid, Israel would have to give up its right to spend up to 26.3 percent of the aid locally.

The final agreement indeed phases out the local-procurement feature, but under far easier terms than defense industry leaders had expected. The draft agreement had called for the phase-out

to begin in year one and be completed by year six, but under the final agreement the process won’t begin until year six.

“During the first six years of the agreement, Israeli industry will be even better off than in the previous one, relatively speaking,” said an Israeli government source who requested anonymity. “

Now they’ll be getting 26 percent of a bigger aid pie—$3.8 billion instead of the $3.1 billion of the last few years.” [Gail Sez: compared with about $815 million now.]

Still, the increase in U.S. aid, after months of negotiations between Washington & Jerusalem, isn’t as dramatic as the headline figures suggest. In recent years, Israel has been receiving supplements of $600 million & $730 million to develop anti-missile & anti-tunnel technology.

But the timetable will also give Israeli defense companies time to adjust to the new situation; for instance, by setting up U.S. subsidiaries that will be considered American companies in terms of procurement, the source said.

According to defense industry experts, Israel’s biggest contractors like Elbit Systems and Israel Aerospace Industries, which have the resources to set up U.S. operations or already have them, won’t be affected by the winding down of the local-procurement clause.

The real problem is for the scores of midsize and small defense companies that don’t have that option, said Ziva Eger, responsible for foreign investment and industrial cooperation at the Economy and Industry Ministry.

To help them, she said, her people will be approaching big U.S. companies to buy Israeli defense goods or even intellectual property from smaller ones, since so many of Israel’s defense contractors specialize in electronics, communications and cyber-war.

Since the money comes from U.S. aid, Israel can’t require these big companies to offset the value of their Israeli contracts by buying or investing in Israel. But Eger said she’s counting on the Defense Ministry’s cooperation to coax companies into doing so.

Copyright © Ha’aretz Daily Newspaper Ltd. All rights reserved.

10.Arlene Kushner “From Israel: The Fate of America” Nov. 6, 2016

>??? NO PHOTOS

Joshua Lotta (Getty Images)

Donald Trump is on track to double Gov. Mitt Romney’s support among African-American voters, according to a series of state polls.

In 2012, African-Americans comprised a record 13 percent of all voters. President Barack Obama was reelected with 93 percent of the African-American vote, leaving Gov. Mitt Romney with only 6 percent of the African-American vote. Obama is now campaigning against Trump, and hoping to keep his share of the African-American vote below the 11 percent that George W. Bush won in 2004 during the housing bubble.

On Friday, a poll of 506 Pennsylvania voters by Harper Polling showed Trump has the support of 18.46 percent of African-Americans. That’s 12.5 points more than Romney’s share of the national vote in 2012, and if it proves true during the ballot, that 18.46 percent African-American support translates into 2 point shift towards Trump. The poll also said another 4.6 percent were undecided.

The Harper poll is small, with an error margin of 4.4 percent, but an Oct. 30 poll of 1,249 likely voters in Pennsylvania showed Trump has 19 percent support among African Americans, while another 7 percent remain undecided. That poll has a error margin of 2.77 percent.

In next-door Michigan, two nights of a tracking poll conducted for Fox 2 of 1,150 likely voters showed Trump with 14 percent support and 19 percent support, leaving Clinton with 83 percent and 79 percent support. That’s equivalent to a two-point shift from Clinton to Trump in the state.

“We’re showing Donald Trump doing far better among African-Americans than any other Republican in modern memory, said John Yob, CEO of a Michigan-based polling firm, Strategic National. Trump “has done an excellent job in campaigning for the votes of African-Americans,” he said, partly by campaigning in Detroit, said Yob, whose automated tracking polls show Trump and Clinton running level in the state.

Trump is gaining in Michigan partly because many African-American voters — especially younger voters who backed Sen. Bernie Saunders — distrust Clinton, said Wayne Bradley, state director of African-American engagement for the Michigan Republican Party. “There is a tremendous trust deficit with Hillary Clinton” because tough anti-crime laws were established when her husband was president in the 1990s, he said.

That distrust has helped cause a sharp drop in the number of absentee ballots mailed in from Detroit, even as other parts of the state sent in more ballots that before, Bradley said. Faced with a low turnout, the Clinton campaign is trying to frighten African-Americans to vote, but “that’s not a convincing enough argument,” he said.

“Detroit as of Wednesday had seen absentee ballots returns equaling just 46 percent of the total 2012 absentee vote in the city, and the city clerk’s office is forecasting a decline of 10,000 absentee ballots compared to 2012, a fall of 12.5 percent,” according to a review of absentee records by the Gongwer.com website, which intensively tracks Michigan politics. It is “possible that the falloff portends reduced [election day] voting at the precincts, in which case … Clinton could net something like 32,000 fewer votes out of the city than President Barack Obama did in 2012.”

But other polls offer better news to Clinton. A Detroit Free Press poll of 600 likely Michigan voters released Nov. 4 showed that “Among black voters, her margin also grew substantially, to 92% compared to 88% two weeks ago.”

National Trends

Trump’s gain among African-American voters is happening in many states, alongside an overall reduction in African-American enthusiasm and support for Obama’s designated successor. That drop-off in support from Obama’s 93 percent level will likely reduce the turnout for Clinton.

That’s a problem for Democrats, because a 7.5 percent drop in nationwide African-American turnout would be equal to a one-point drop in a nationwide vote for Clinton.

Reports say the early-voting turnout by African-Americans has dropped by up to 10 percent in North Carolina and by somewhat less in Florida. President Barack Obama and other top Democrats have hopscotched through the states to push that turnout back up by election day.

But pollsters face problems when trying to gauge opinions in a high-stakes emotional competition.

For example, a large slice of African-Americans are picking “undecided” in some polls. The Washington Post is reporting that Clinton is leading Trump by 79 percentage points among African-Americans, but the fine print in the article says Clinton’s score is 82 percent and Trump’s score is 3 percent — leaving 15 percent who did not pick either candidate. So if Trump gets just one-in-five of the undecided African-American voters, he reaches Romney’s 2012 level.

Some concerned people lie to pollsters. For example, roughly 7 percent of college grads hide their support for Trump when they’re ask by pollsters over the phone, perhaps out of fear of penalties if their choice was made public. So when polls show a non-answer from respondents, for example, many undecided voters, the votes may be hiding a weak or strong preference for Trump.

These factor may be impacting polls of African-Americans, who are being hammered by claims from Clinton and Obama that Trump is supposedly a racist. “If you accept the support of Klan sympathizers — the Klan — and hesitate when asked about that support, then you’ll tolerate that support when you’re in office,” Obama told an African-American crowd in North Carolina on Nov. 3.

For example, Public Policy Polling — which mostly works for Democratic clients — used phone interviews in a poll that showed Trump with just 9 percent support in Michigan among 957 likely voters, of whom 12 percent were African-American. The poll said none of the roughly 110 African-Americans were undecided in a two-person race, even though 8 percent said they were unsure when they were asked if they had a favorable view of Trump.

In contrast, the Harper Polling survey in Pennsylvania got very different answers from African-Americans. Trump got 18.5 percent support in a four-person race, although many respondents waffled when they were asked to pick between just Clinton and Trump. When asked to pick either of the two main candidates, only 12.3 percent supported Trump, while 13.9 percent declared themselves to be undecided. So Trump actually picked up half of the undecideds when the respondents were allowed to chose from the four candidates.

Polls

A national poll by TIPP showed Clinton at only 75 percent support among all non-whites, including Hispanics, African-Americans and Latinos. That poll showed Trump getting support from 15 percent of non-whites, leaving 5 percent undecided and 5 percent supporting other candidates.

In North Carolina, 19 percent of African-Americans support Trump, according to an Oct. 30 survey of 1176 likely voters by Remington Research Group.

An Oct. 28 to Oct. 31 poll in North Carolina by SurveyUSA showed Trump with 14 percent support in a poll of 800 adults, including 659 likely voters. African-Americans comprised 21 percent of the voters in the poll. SurveyUSA is the top-ranked pollster in Nate Silver’s rankings.

But a late October poll of African-Americans in North Carolina by Siena University showed 89 percent support for Clinton and 1 percent for Trump — but it also showed 6 percent staying they did not know who they will vote for, and 11 percent support for the GOP Gov. Pat McCrory.

In Florida, a Siena University poll showed that Trump had the support of 13 percent of African-Americans. More ominously for Clinton, she had the support of only 83 percent, while 4 percent said they didn’t know who to vote for. If Trump gets one-quarter of the 4 percent, he reaches 14 percent of the African-American vote, leaving Clinton with roughly 86 percent.

In Virginia, a survey by Public Policy Polling taken in Nov. 3 and Nov. 4 showed Trump with 9 percent support and Clinton with 91 percent support. A Remington Research automated poll of 1,106 likely voters in Virginia showed Trump with 19 percent, and Clinton with just 78 percent support.

In Georgia, a Nov. 2 to Nov. 3 poll of 1,000 likely voters showed Trump with 12 percent of the African-American vote, leaving Clinton with 85 percent.

Amid the disagreement, rivalries and complexity, Bradley is confident that Trump will do well among African-Americans. His final tally as the GOP candidate “will be a higher number that it has been in the past… [because] he’s working, he’s coming to these cities to deliver the message.”

The African-American vote may even be enough to help push Trump over the so-called “blue wall” of Democratic northern states that stands in his path to the White House.