Saturday, February 17, 2018

When Ellison Broke Bread With Farrakhan

When Ellison Broke Bread With Farrakhan

Brotherhood-linked congressman publicly rejected Nation of Islam -- but it was all for show.

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After publicly repudiating his former colleagues at the Nation of Islam, DNC deputy chairman Keith Ellison dined with the group’s notorious leader Louis Farrakhan and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani in 2013, according to reports.
The jihadist-friendly Ellison, a Democrat congressman representing Minnesota, is a former co-chairman of the Communist-linked Congressional Progressive Caucus.
Although Ellison was not a senior Democratic Party official in 2013, now that his DNC post makes him much more than a fringe figure in his party, the meeting takes on a greater, darker significance for Democrats, putting them in bed with raging genocidal anti-Semites, Muslim terrorists, and other enemies of the United States.
The private Sept. 24, 2013, event at the One UN Hotel in Manhattan, across the street from the United Nations complex, was reported in the Oct. 2, 2013, issue of the Nation of Islam newspaper, Final Call. Rouhani was in New York for the 68th UN General Assembly. “The dialogue revolved around the Iranian president’s speech and how to move forward in regard to relations with the United States,” according to the newspaper. “Translators were included in the meeting to facilitate communications in English and Farsi.”
"Abdul Akbar Muhammad, international representative of the Nation of Islam, and Supreme Capt. Mustapha Farrakhan were part of the Nation of Islam delegation," the report stated.
Democrat lawmakers attending the event included Ellison, a Muslim, Andre Carson of Indiana, also a Muslim, and Gregory Meeks of New York. Ellison’s participation in the 2013 event was referenced by the Wall Street Journal last week, based on the Final Call article.
Rouhani is president of the Islamic Republic of Iran, which conducts daily “Death to America” and “Death to Israel” rallies, and maintains a repressive police-state apparatus to crush dissent. Members of religions other than Islam are persecuted in Iran and homosexuality is punishable by death. Ellison, of course, is an outspoken supporter of Iran and its nuclear ambitions.
Farrakhan makes no effort to hide his racism, viewing it as an essential component of his religion and as something of which one should be proud.
He has spoken of "white devils" and of “the white man” as the “anti-Christ.” Whites are “vicious beasts” and “the skunks of the planet,” according to Farrakhan. “White people are potential humans ... they haven’t evolved yet.” In a 1997 interview on “Meet the Press,” he stated, “It is not accidental that the black male is in the condition he is in,” and he claimed there was a “conspiracy of our government against the black male.”
Farrakhan calls Jews "bloodsuckers" who in his view somehow undermine American blacks. He calls Judaism, which antedates Islam by at least 2,000 years, a "gutter religion," and describes Adolph Hitler as "a very great man."
Farrakhan is an intellectual inspiration to Ellison. Not surprisingly, Ellison has a long, well-documented history of defending Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam, which have been tracked by Discover the Networks.
As early as 1989, Ellison was denying the Nation of Islam was racist. In the 1990s, he served as a spokesman for the group.
In a 1995 column, Ellison heaped praise on Farrakhan:
Minister Farrakhan is a role model for black youth”; “is not an anti-Semite”; “is a sincere, tireless, and uncompromising advocate of the black community and other oppressed people around the world”; and is regarded by “most black people” as “a role model for youth and, increasingly, a central voice for our collective aspirations.
But Ellison’s political ambitions forced him to disavow Farrakhan and his group, insincerely, as it now turns out.
In 2006 during a run for Congress, Ellison tried to distance himself from his past involvement with the Nation of Islam, writing a letter to a Jewish group. He apologized to Jewish leaders, writing, "I have long since distanced myself from and rejected the Nation of Islam." In the letter he falsely claimed he had been involved with the group for a mere 18 months around the time of the Million Man March in 1995, when in fact the period was closer to 10 years in duration. He also claimed not to have known about the Nation of Islam’s anti-Semitic views, saying he “did not adequately scrutinize” those views, and added that he had never expressed or defended such views. Around that time, he reportedly used the aliases Keith Hakim, Keith X Ellison, and Keith Ellison-Muhammad.
In 2016 while he was running for the DNC chairmanship, he tried to turn the tables on his critics, accusing them of trying to smear him by bringing up his association with Farrakhan and Nation of Islam.
Reports of his ties to Farrakhan were “bad reporting” and a distraction, Ellison said with a straight face on MSNBC. "I have a 10 year record in Congress," he said. "It is just that kind of reporting that is not quality and doesn't help people understand the real issues."
"What does he have to do with anything going on in this race?" Ellison asked about Farrakhan. "Absolutely nothing."
"We're talking about something that happened in 1995. This is a year when the Million Man March took off -- people were attacking it. I was very proud to be a part of it. But here I am having to answer questions about this, and I'm not talking about what our country needs to do and what the Democratic Party needs to do, because of this smear campaign from 20 years ago."
Left-wing radicalism, anti-Americanism, and sympathy for Islamofascism aren’t exactly new in Democrat circles, but it is unusual for someone as high in the hierarchy of the Democratic National Committee as Ellison now is to be so associated with odious racist figures such as Farrakhan and the president of a country committed not only to the extermination of Jews, but to wiping the United States and Israel off the map.
But times have changed, and not for the better. Nowadays those who urge the extinguishing of American democracy and the murder of police officers are considered legitimate activists. Over the years Ellison has defended Kwame Ture (formerly known as Stokely Carmichael), as well as cop-killers and leftist icons Mumia Abu Jamal, Assata Shakur, and Geronimo Pratt.
Last month Ellison implicitly expressed support for the use of violence against President Trump in a tweet as he posed for a selfie with the cover of Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook, by Mark Bray. “I just found the book that strike[s] fear in the heart of @realDonaldTrump[.]” Antifa is short for anti-fascist. Members of the movement use physical violence against conservatives and anyone else they lump in with the purported fascists they claim to oppose.
Ellison’s deficient character, as well as his ties to very bad people who want to hurt Americans, should worry patriots, especially with polling showing Democrats may be on the verge of recapturing Congress this November.

Monday, November 21, 2016

The Trump revolution, Israel and American Jews


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The Trump revolution, Israel and American Jews



 
IIsiPPho
The victory of Donald Trump in the U.S. presidential elections will have long-term global repercussions at many levels. It represents a revolt against extreme postmodernism which has undermined the moral fiber of the West and its willingness to defend itself, facilitating the emergence of brutal Islamic terror throughout the world.
Many, if not most, of those who voted for Trump were offended by his vulgarity and aggressive language and did not support all aspects of his policies. They voted for him because they regarded him as the only opportunity to break with the status quo.
The refusal of his antagonists — the self-styled liberal guardians of democracy — to accept the outcome of the election was despicable and unprecedented and contrasts with the acquiescence of the defeated Republicans when Barack Obama won both of his elections.
Whether or not Trump will succeed in restoring America’s former global and political status remains to be seen. We should bear in mind that when Ronald Reagan was elected, the media and much of the “intelligentsia” described him as an idiot and predicted disaster. But he proved to be one of the greatest American presidents.
Trump’s victory could have dramatic ramifications for Israel. Of course, pre-election undertakings are never fully implemented, but it is historically unprecedented for Israel to enjoy such a committed pro-Israel incoming president together with massive support from both houses of Congress.
Trump, who literally gushes over Israel, has always been closely associated with Jews in business and politics. Aside from his family, his senior advisers include committed devotees of Israel.
He has repeatedly praised Israel and refers to us as America’s greatest ally; he has endorsed Israel’s position on defensible borders and stated that he has no objection to construction in the major settlement blocs and Jerusalem; he called on the Palestinians to recognize Israel as a Jewish state and is opposed to imposed solutions, insisting that the only way to peace is by direct negotiations between the parties; and most importantly, he has made it clear that he totally repudiates President Obama’s criticism of Israel for failing to make progress in the peace talks and his application of moral equivalence between Israelis and Palestinians.
Trump committed to moving the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem — although that is an unfulfilled pre-electoral promise made by many of his predecessors, both Democrat and Republican.
He has also undertaken to confront the Iranian terrorist regime and either terminate the bogus nuclear deal or at least pressure the Iranians to adhere to their commitments.
His vice president-elect, Mike Pence, is a passionately devoted Christian friend of Israel and a seasoned politician who Trump has announced will be his major adviser and policy formulator (see video address).
And whatever tensions exist between Trump and both of the Republican-controlled houses of Congress, the one issue that they share in common is support of Israel.
However, none of this should be misinterpreted to mean that the Trump administration will favor annexation or a one-state policy. Trump has made it clear that he still endorses a two-state policy but, in contrast to Obama, he stipulates that it cannot be imposed without providing Israel with defensible borders and all of the security guarantees it requires — an unattainable objective and at present, not even on the horizon.
For this reason, the bombastic declarations by the Israeli Right and particularly Habayit Hayehudi Chairman Naftali Bennett’s calls for annexation in the wake of the election results are irresponsible and could be highly counterproductive. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should tell his coalition members to zip their mouths shut and enable him to move forward by engaging in silent diplomacy with Trump, who has already extended a warm invitation to meet with him.
One of the negative repercussions of the Trump victory is the accelerated erosion of bipartisanship and the growing influence of the radical anti-Israel wing of the Democratic Party. Nothing exemplifies this more than the likelihood of the anti-Israel Muslim Congressman Keith Ellison — who was initially funded by the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations — assuming the role of chairman of the Democratic National Committee, supported by leading Jewish Senator Chuck Schumer. The post was formerly held by pro-Israel Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Simultaneously, anti-Israel Jewish Senator Bernie Sanders is emerging as one of the most powerful forces in the defeated  radicalized Democratic Party.
The most bizarre aspect of this election result is the almost hysterical reaction by liberal segments of the Jewish community. That 70% of Jews supported Hillary Clinton is not surprising and consistent with their longstanding obsession with liberalism. But the manipulation of Jewish issues as a political vehicle by some American Jewish leaders to oppose Trump will be recorded as an act of infamy.
The trailblazer was Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt, who shamelessly uses this once-venerable organization as a mantle to promote his radical liberal agenda. Commissioned to combat anti-Semitism, he had the chutzpah to harness the ADL to condemn the Republicans as “anti-Zionist” because they failed to relate to a two-state solution in their Middle East policy platform.
He condemned Trump for “tolerating” anti-Semites because he declined to dignify the Ku Klux Klan by responding to their expressions of support for him. In fact, thanks to the ADL’s anti-Trump hysteria, anti-Semites and scum like David Duke were brought to the forefront of the mainstream media, a goal which they had sought unsuccessfully to achieve over the past decades. It also encouraged racists and anti-Semites to emerge from their closets.
This contrasts starkly with the muted response to by liberals to Obama’s relationship with Rev. Jeremiah Wright, a paranoid anti-Semite. Not only did Obama attend his sermons with his family, but Wright actually officiated at his wedding and was appointed by him in 2007 to the African American Religious Leadership Committee. He only dissociated himself from Wright’s views after media exposure but refused to disown him personally, relating to him as “an old uncle.” Not even the fiercest critics of Trump can suggest any comparable relationship with Duke or any other identifiable anti-Semite. But his critics continue defaming him as a promoter of anti-Semites.
Clearly motivated by a very partisan agenda, they take this to insane levels. A star motif used in Trump’s election propaganda was pounced upon by the ADL, claiming that it was a Star of David employed to inflame Jew-hatred. The frenzied ADL also suggested that Trump’s condemnation of the power of the international banks (also promoted by Bernie Sanders) was a subtle means of promoting “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.” One has to be either a paranoid delusional or an anti-Semite to genuinely believe that any reference to international banks is a reference to Jews. And to top this, a negative reference to the anti-Israel George Soros — which most Jews would endorse — was also alleged to be anti-Semitic.
Not surprisingly, the hysteria impacted on Jews at the grass roots.
Yet in the wake of the election of a most pro-Israel U.S. government, in which Jews and staunch friends of Israel are likely to assume key positions, with the president’s daughter having converted to Judaism and observing an Orthodox religious lifestyle, many Jews have simply lost the plot. A number of Reform and Conservative synagogues actually held special mourning services to bewail the advent of fascism in America. One prominent Conservative rabbi in New York even made a shocking analogy between the Trump victory and the rise of Nazism prior to the Holocaust.
The ultimate obscenity was the hysterical attack on Trump’s appointment of the controversial right-wing media executive Steve Bannon as his strategic adviser. Without any credible proof, the ADL accused him of being an anti-Semite who would pave the way for a return to anti-Semitism and white supremacy.
It so happens that Bannon is surrounded by Jews in his media company, Breitbart News. He is known for his fervent support for Israel and his condemnations of the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism on campus. One can disagree with Trump’s selection of Bannon, but for Greenblatt and the ADL to smear him as an anti-Semite is beyond the pale. The uproar following this was so great that Greenblatt was ultimately obliged to whisper a withdrawal of this false allegation.
The double standards applied by the ADL is exemplified by the fact that despite the outright anti-Semitism and promotion of BDS against Israel promoted by the Black Lives Matter movement, Greenblatt does not call for Jews to boycott the organization and still refers approvingly to the “positive” aspects of its work, suggesting that only a “small minority” imposed the anti-Semitic aspects of its program. Apparently the ADL adopt very liberal standards to real anti-Semitic groups if they come from the Left.
Greenblatt’s use of a revered body created to combat anti-Semitism to promote his own partisan political agenda and even stooping to use allegations of anti-Semitism to slander his opponents is scandalous. He has no place in a mainstream Jewish organization.
American Jewry today stands at a crossroads. Ironically, at a time when possibly the most pro-Israel U.S. administration in history is about to take office, significant sectors of the Jewish community are falsely accusing its leaders of promoting anti-Semitism. It should be noted that other mainstream Jewish bodies, like the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, American Israel Public Affairs Committee, and the American Jewish Committee, did not engage in this campaign and merely called for unity. But the Zionist Organization of America was the only significant Jewish organization protesting against this partisan defamatory campaign.
However, it is obvious that increasing numbers of Reform, Conservative and secular Jews consider Israel low among their priorities and confuse liberalism or “social justice” as a universalist basis for a Jewish commitment with no Jewish content or values. In all likelihood, they will become even more estranged from Israel as they seek to further ingratiate themselves with their liberal friends.
Fortunately, this will be compensated by the intensified support for Israel from committed Jews and Christian friends.
 
Isi Leibler may be contacted at ileibler@leibler.com

Tuesday, November 15, 2016

Trump is the Best Thing That Has Happened to Israel in Years

“Instead of slanders, Jews should offer up prayers of Thanksgiving.”
BY DAVID P. GOLDMAN 
NOVEMBER 14, 2016
The hysteria in the Establishment is astonishing: today's email blast from the usually staid Financial Times begins, "Donald Trump has chosen Reince Priebus, the establishment head of the Republican National Committee, as his chief of staff, while naming Steve Bannon — his campaign chair who ran Breitbart News, a website associated with the alt-right and white supremacists — as his chief strategist and counsellor."
To claim that Breitbart is associated with white supremacists is a despicable lie, but the FT feels compelled to say such things because polite opinion requires ritual anathemas of Trump. And the liberal Jewish website The Forward writes, "The reaction was quick and furious from Jews and anti-hate groups. The Anti-Defamation League, which stays out of partisan politics and vowed to seek to work with Trump after his election, denounced Bannon as 'hostile to American values.'" The Forward headline asks, "Will Steve Bannon bring anti-Semitism into Trump's inner circle?"
This again is a foul slander. I know Steve Bannon, and have had several long discussions with him about politics. I first met him when he approached me at a conference to tell me that he liked my writing, which is unabashedly Zionist. Steve is strongly pro-Israel, and it is utterly ridiculous to suggest that he is anti-Semitic.
The Establishment is floored and flummoxed. It doesn't understand what it did wrong, it doesn't understand why it has been evicted from power, and it can only explain its miserable situation as the consequence of an evil conspiracy. In short, the Establishment is having a paranoid tantrum, compounding its humiliation with a public meltdown. Sadly, that includes liberal Jews.
Trump's election is the best thing that has happened to Israel in many years. It eliminates the risk of a diplomatic stab in the back at the Security Council and sends a dire warning to Iran, the only real existential threat to the Jewish State. The security of the Jewish people in their homeland is vastly enhanced by the vote on November 8, and Jews everywhere should thank God that the head of state of the world's most powerful country is a friend of Israel with Jewish grandchildren. Instead of slanders, Jews should offer up prayers of Thanksgiving.
How is it that US liberal Jewish leadership are silent on the countless anti-Semites associated with Obama and his administration, including Muslim Brotherhood operatives? Read below for a concrete example!
This disgraceful CAIR leader calls for the overthrow of the US government and yet, according to the article,
“Ayloush is not a marginal figure but someone with access to the heights of American power, including the White House.
According to an Investigative Project on Terrorism analysis in 2012, he was a delegate to the 2012 Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, N.C. [and] ... attended at least two White House meetings.”

CAIR Leader: Overthrow the U.S. Government

by Daniel Pipes  •  Nov 11, 2016
Cross-posted from National Review Online


Tweet by CAIR's Hussam Ayloush just as Donald Trump's victory became apparent.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) successfully presents itself to the media as a benign civil rights organization, comparable to the NAACP or the ADL, a description that conservatives ineffectively rail against.
In this light, perhaps a tweet sent out just after midnight EST on Nov. 9 by Hussam Ayloush, long-time head of CAIR's Los Angeles office, will help awaken the press to CAIR's true Islamist identity.
Ayloush wrote, "Ok, repeat after me: Al-Shaab yureed isqat al-nizaam. (Arab Spring chant)."
That second line is Arabic ("الشعب يريد إسقاط النظام‎‎") for "The people wants to bring down the regime."
In other words, Ayloush unambiguously and directly called for the overthrow of the U.S. government.
Comments:

Email from Hussam Ayloush referring to "Zionazis."
(1) Ayloush may be the most vicious of the CAIR leaders. So far as I know, for example, he's the only one of them to bandy about the term "Zionazi," as evidenced in his e-mail below, dated March 18, 2002.
(2) Ayloush is not a marginal figure but someone with access to the heights of American power, including the White House. According to an Investigative Project on Terrorism analysis in 2012, he was a delegate to the 2012 Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, N.C. [and] ... attended at least two White House meetings.
The logs show Ayloush met with Paul Monteiro, associate director of the White House Office of Public Engagement on July 8, 2011 and Amanda Brown, assistant to the White House director of political affairs Patrick Gaspard, on June 6, 2009. According to reliable sources, Monteiro was White House liaison for secret contacts with CAIR, especially with Ayloush.

CAIR-Los Angeles head Hussam Ayloush.
Further, "IPT has learned that the White House logs curiously have omitted Ayloush's three meetings with two other senior White House officials."
(3) The dawning of Donald Trump's victory was apparently a trying moment for Ayloush, so he let loose with an emotion he'd normally have kept under wraps.
In other words, he offered a rare, candid insight into the mind of one CAIR apparatchik.
(4) According to 18 U.S. Code § 2385, "Advocating overthrow of Government":
Whoever knowingly or willfully advocates, abets, advises, or teaches the duty, necessity, desirability, or propriety of overthrowing or destroying the government of the United States ... Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both.
So, journalists, editors, and producers: do please note what CAIR stands for.
Daniel Pipes (DanielPipes.org, @DanielPipes) is president of the Middle East Forum.

Thursday, November 10, 2016

Don't Blame the West


Everyone except barbaric jihadists will greet with delight the news that Iraqi military forces, helped by U.S. training, and allies are approaching to liberate the city of Mosul, the largest Sunni center in Iraq, that had been captured by a few thousand ISIS militants in June 2014, and been part of the Islamic Caliphate imposed by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.
The intense fighting for the city illustrates the pivotal Middle East problem, the competing interests, the mosaic of warring religious sects and ethnic and tribal groups. Shiites from Hashed al-Shaabi (Popular Mobilization Units) are linked with Sunni jihadists, Kurdish peshmerga, and the Iraqi army against the ISIS force, now seemingly divided into foreign and local contingents.
Who are the true messengers? The Sunni Arab Nineveh Guards from the northern Iraqi province are trained and supported by Turkey, which sees Mosul as part of its historic zone of influence. The Christian community is divided: some Christians are linked to Iraq to fight ISIS; others are linked to Kurdish forces. Members of the Yazidi minority have ties to almost all other groups in the fighting.
Fashionable talk of a homogeneous Arab population requires suspension of disbelief. It is an arguable proposition that there is a clash of civilization between the Arab and Muslim world and Western democracies based on religious and cultural identities. But more certain is the existence of continuing relentless internal war within the Arab civilization, divided as it is, and has long been, on issues of religious and ethnic identity as well as political rivalries and struggles for supremacy.
This ought to be the first recognition of reality for the new U.S. president who must end the Obama passivity concerning Middle East issues and not be a party to the blame game. The area is vital for U.S. interests and for solutions to current problems, Islamist terrorism, human rights abuses, migration from Arab countries, nuclear proliferation, and Iran.
The U.S. role is crucial despite the assertion that the present disarray and turmoil in the area is due to Western imperialism or colonialism. This assertion became prominent on the hundreth anniversary of the secret Sykes-Picot Agreement signed in May 16, 1916 and made known by the Bolsheviks in the revolution on November 23, 1917. The Agreement is blamed by Arabs for causing the ills of the area and pointed to as the illustration of Western arrogance, imperialism, and great power politics.
Sykes-Picot (S-P) was an agreement between Sir Mark Sykes, British diplomat and Conservative M.P., and a junior French diplomat Francois Georges-Picot. Contemplating during World War I and anticipating the fall of the Ottoman Empire after the War, they envisaged it should be replaced by creating a number of states with coherent borders. The two powers would therefore split the Middle East into spheres of influence.
S-P in hindsight has been criticized for ignoring the multiple realities and rivalries in the area. It drew a line between north and south, from the "e" in Acre (now in Israel) to the last "K" in Kirkuk in Iraq. One part of the area, the north, or Levant, which was to include Lebanon, the Syrian coast, and part of Turkey would be under French control, while the south, first called Mesopotamia before becoming Iraq and Palestine, would be under British control.
About the Arab resentment, envy, and rancor, three points can be made. S-P was not the villain in imposing territorial arrangements to replace the Ottoman Empire in a new Middle East. It certainly proposed but did not impose the creation of states with particular boundaries. This was done by international conferences, especially the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, and the Mandate System of the League of Nations.
The city of Mosul itself is an interesting example of deference to political rivalries. At first in the British-French formula it was allocated to the new Iraq that was envisaged. Then, because of nearby oil discoveries, it became part of Syria. The problem remains even today. Turkish President Erdogan asserts, incorrectly, that Mosul has historically belonged to Turkey, and therefore his country should play a role in its future.
Two more important general criticisms arise from S-P. One is the rejection of the right of Western powers to impose borders on the Arab world or to interfere to prevent chaos. In this regard S-P did not stand alone. In addition, there were the Constantinople Agreement of March 1915 between UK, France, and Russia to give Constantinople to Russia, and the Treaty of Saint-Jean-de-Maurianne of August 1917 by which Italy and France would share control of West Anatolia.
The second crucial issue was the criticism of Western initiatives to create homogeneous countries in an area full of Shias, Sunni, Arabs, Kurds, Christians, Druze, and Alawites in the post-Ottoman Middle East. After all, the Ottoman Empire had given autonomy to the ethnic and religious groups within it. S-P and other were accused of destroying autonomy in attempts to deal with the problem of the areas under Ottoman rule. Three provinces, Baghdad, Basra, and Mosul, would correspond to boundaries of Iraq. Four others, Damascus, Beirut, Aleppo, Deir ez-Zor, correspond to Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine, and a strip of southern Turkey.
It cannot be denied that the two great powers in the post-World War I world were conscious of their own economic and security interests in the Middle East. But it also true that local Arab elites played a significant role in the ruling process. Local figures and forces were responsible for political development of the region.
Key figures in this were members of the Hashemite family, headed by Hussein bin Ali, Grand Sharif and Emir of Mecca. As a result of pressure, two of his sons were given prominent positions. Emir Faisal, born in Mecca (Saudi Arabia) became king of Iraq, 1921-33. Abdullah became the ruler, at first emir, of Transjordan, a territory that was originally to be part of the Jewish National Home but was hived off as a separate entity by Winston Churchill, then Colonial Secretary, in 1921. No Jews would be allowed in Transjordan, which became Jordan in 1946.  Abdulla ruled there as king until 1951, when he was assassinated.
The U.S. president, even when accounting for mistakes in policy, should forgo apologies. The ongoing war in Syria and Iraq indicates that international arrangements such as the 100-year-old S-P have little to do with today's problems, and the crisis of legitimacy in the area.  In playing a role, the West should not be blamed for local deficiencies nor for the repressive and corrupt regimes that have been supported by abundant oil money. Instead, it should encourage Arab societies to be more open and follow the kind of reforms beginning in Tunisia and Morocco.  
The new president can suggest that Kurds, deprived of a state of their own after World War I, should be given one. Above all, Western leaders should make clear that political stability in the Middle East should not depend on oppressive or arbitrary government, and that religious liberty and rights of minorities should be advanced.

Sunday, November 6, 2016

Clinton directed her maid to print out classified materials

Clinton directed her maid to print out classified materials
By: Paul Sperry
Posted By Ruth King on November 6th, 2016
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.
In fact, Marina Santos was called on so frequently to receive e-mails that she may hold the secrets to E-mailgate — if only the FBI and Congress would subpoena her and the equipment she used.
Clinton entrusted far more than the care of her DC residence, known as Whitehaven, to Santos. She expected the Filipino immigrant to handle state secrets, further opening the Democratic presidential nominee to criticism that she played fast and loose with national security.
Clinton would first receive highly sensitive e-mails from top aides at the State Department and then request that they, in turn, forward the messages and any attached documents to Santos to print out for her at the home.
Among other things, Clinton requested Santos print out drafts of her speeches, confidential memos and “call sheets” — background information and talking points prepared for the secretary of state in advance of a phone call with a foreign head of state.
“Pls ask Marina to print for me in am,” Clinton e-mailed top aide Huma Abedin regarding a redacted 2011 message marked sensitive but unclassified.
In a classified 2012 e-mail dealing with the new president of Malawi, another Clinton aide, Monica Hanley, advised Clinton, “We can ask Marina to print this.”
“Revisions to the Iran points” was the subject line of a classified April 2012 e-mail to Clinton from Hanley. In it, the text reads, “Marina is trying to print for you.”
Both classified e-mails were marked “confidential,” the tier below “secret” or “top secret.”
Santos also had access to a highly secure room called an SCIF (sensitive compartmented information facility) that diplomatic security agents set up at Whitehaven, according to FBI notes from an interview with Abedin.
From within the SCIF, Santos — who had no clearance — “collected documents from the secure facsimile machine for Clinton,” the FBI notes revealed.
Just how sensitive were the papers Santos presumably handled? The FBI noted Clinton periodically received the Presidential Daily Brief — a top-secret document prepared by the CIA and other US intelligence agencies — via the secure fax.
A 2012 “sensitive” but unclassified e-mail from Hanley to Clinton refers to a fax the staff wanted Clinton “to see before your Netanyahu mtg. Marina will grab for you.”
Yet it appears Clinton was never asked by the FBI in its yearlong investigation to turn over the iMac Santos used to receive the e-mails, or the printer she used to print out the documents, or the printouts themselves.
As The Post first reported, copies of Clinton’s 33,000 allegedly destroyed e-mails still exist in other locations and could be recovered if investigators were turned loose to seize them. Higher-ups at the Justice Department reportedly have blocked them from obtaining search warrants to obtain the evidence.
It also appears the FBI did not formally interview Santos as a key witness in its investigation.
This is a major oversight: Santos may know the whereabouts of a missing Apple MacBook laptop and USB flash drive that contain all of Clinton’s e-mails archived over her four years in office.
In 2013, Hanley downloaded Clinton’s e-mails from her private server to the MacBook and flash drive.
“The two copies of the Clinton e-mail archive (one on the archive laptop and one on the thumb drive) were intended to be stored in Clinton’s Chappaqua and Whitehaven residences,” the FBI said in its case summary.
But Hanley says the devices were “lost,” and the FBI says it “does not have either item in its possession.”
In addition to Abedin, Santos worked closely with Hanley at Whitehaven and could shed light on the mystery — if only she were asked about it.
When a Post reporter confronted Santos at her DC apartment Friday, she would say only, “I don’t speak to reporters.”
According to a 2010 profile in The Philippine Star, close Clinton friend Vernon Jordan recommended Santos to the Clintons after she worked part-time for him.
Bill Clinton gave a speech in Manila as part of his foundation and took time to visit with the family of the “mayordoma [housekeeper] of his Washington, DC, home — Marina Santos.”
He was quoted as describing Santos as the “wonderful woman who runs our home in Washington, without whom Hillary will not be able to serve as secretary of state.” The article ended remarking, without a hint of irony: “Marina now runs his house so that he and his wife can better serve interests higher than their own.”
Santos could turn out to be the Betty Currie of the Clinton e-mail scandal. Currie was the secretary for President Clinton. She also came recommended by Jordan, and became famous as a central witness in the Monica Lewinsky scandal for her handling of gifts given to Clinton’s mistress.
Investigators had sought the gifts, allegedly hidden under Currie’s bed on orders from Clinton, as evidence.
The State Department and Clinton campaign did not respond to requests for comment.
Paul Sperry, a former DC bureau chief for Investor’s Business Daily and a Hoover Institution media fellow, is the author of “Infiltration.

VIRAL: 13yr. Old Trump Girl HAMMERS Hillary – ROCKS the House in Arizona!

http://clashdaily.com/2016/10/viral-13yr-old-trump-girl-hammers-hillary-rocks-house-arizona/?utm_source=newsletter&utm

Monday, August 1, 2016

Friday, July 29, 2016

Israel’s economy – an island of stability

LOGO
Yoram will be in the US in September and November, available for speaking engagements.
Israel’s economy – an island of stability
Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, “Second Thought: A US-Israel Initiative”
Straight from the Jerusalem Boardroom #213, July 29, 2016
http://bit.ly/2atXxd8

1. According to a study conducted by the University of Lausanne, Israel is one of the top five world high-tech powers, as indicated by a 2015 $1bn investment, in Israel, by Apple, creating a hardware development center. The USA, China, Russia and India are, actively, soliciting high-tech cooperation with Israel. India and Israel negotiate a free trade zone, which would increase their current $5bn trade balance. Israel is second only to Russia in the exportation of military systems to India (Jerusalem Post, July 24, 2016).

2.  $245mn raised by Israeli companies in July, 2016; $2.9bn raised, so far, in 2016 ($1.7bn in the 2nd quarter and$1.1bn in the 1st quarter). For example, SafeBreach (cyber) raised $15mn from HP, Deutsche Telecomm, etc.; Prospera (agricultural tech) raised $7mn from the Silicon Valley-headquartered Bessemer Venture Partners; PowerLinx (business matching) raised $7mn from Dun & Bradstreet, France; and Engie (car maintenance) raised $3.5mn from the San Francisco-based 8Partners, the San Francisco Peninsula-based Motus Ventures. (Globes Business Daily, July 27, 2016), etc..

3.  Israel’s Emefcy raised $24mn from US, Chinese, Hong Kong, Singapore and Australian investors (GE Ventures was one of the initial investors), in order to advance its 44 sewage-recycling projects in the US, Israel, Latin America, Ethiopia and, mostly, in China (Globes, July 26). GuardiCore raised $20mn from Cisco, the London and Israel-based 83North, and the Silicon Valley and Israel-based Battery Ventures. SkyCure raised $16.5mn from the Silicon Valley-based Foundation Capital (Globes, July 20).

4. The Israeli gambling websites giant, 888, is negotiating a merger with the British giant, Rank, in order to acquire the $3.6bn British giant, William Hill (Globes), July 25).

5.  A US-Israel cyber cooperation in the protection of financial payments from malicious hacker attacks – which could result in mega billion dollar catastrophes - was announced in Atlanta, GA. Israeli companies excel in the development of firewalls (Globes, July 3).

6. The following is a sample of vital data featured in Adam Reuter’s (Financial Immunities) and Noga Kainan’s (Company Leaders Forum) “Against all odds – Israel is an Island of success:

*Israel’s economy has expanded by 180% during the past 20 years, while the population (8.4mn) has grown by 45%;

*Israel’s GDP is in excess of $300bn compared to $1.2bn in 1949 and $155bn in 2006, GDP per capita is $35,000 (24th in the world);

*Israel’s foreign exchange reserves reached $90bn, an indication of financial stability, bolstered by a highly diversified, high-quality commercial and defense exports, thus minimizing the impact of global slowdown;

*Israel’s ratio of public debt to GDP is systematically shrinking (64%), unlike most OECD;

*Israel’s unemployment rate is decreasing (5%), while labor force participation rate is expanding (77%);

*Israel is among the only 8 countries launching space satellites, a global co-leader with the US in the areas of research, development, manufacturing and launching mini, small and medium-size space satellites;

*Israel is the world leader in the area of per capita research & development: 140 per 10,000 employees;

*86 Israeli companies are traded on NASDAQ, third following the USA and China.

*About 300 global high-tech giants established research & development centers in Israel, leveraging Israel’s brainpower;

*Israel’s population is the youngest in the OECD – median age 31 (OECD – 42), featuring the highest fertility rate (number of births per woman), including an unprecedented surge in secular fertility.