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By Peggy Shapiro, www.americanthinker.com

Where could you hear radio talk show hosts Dennis Prager and Michael Medved, military analyst Elliot Chodoff, Israel’s Ambassador Michael Oren, Senator Joe Lieberman, country music star Randy Travis, and cantor and musical theater singer Dudu Fisher on the same stage with ministers and orthodox rabbis? Where could you see over four thousand Christians waving Israeli and American flags to the singing of national anthems of Israel and the U.S. and breaking out in spontaneous dance during the playing of Havah Nagilah? Where could you witness Baptists, Methodists, Lutherans, and Pentecostals wearing Star of David necklaces, which they had just purchased at an Israel bazaar?  That’s what I heard, saw, and witnessed at the Conference of Christians United for Israel in Washington D.C. on July 19-22 when Christian Zionists from a multitude of denominations and backgrounds took up the huge Convention Center and made over 400 lobby appointments on Capital Hill to speak up for Israel and mark a change in the Jewish-Christian relationship.

The attendees were African Americans, Asians, Caucasians, Hispanics, teens, octogenarians, the affluent, and the unemployed from all over the U.S. I met a Nigerian mechanical engineering student who was pursuing a Master’s Degree and supporting a wife and child, a stunningly beautiful airline hostess who brought her granddaughter, an African American grandmother who was planning her 16th trip to Israel, and a food chemist for a large corporation. I spoke to a shy woman from the southern tip of Illinois. She had never made a public speech or taken political action and called herself “a hick from the sticks.” My roommate, along with 89 others, made their way to Washington from Minnesota on a 24-hour bus ride. The crowd was diverse, but they shared one common mission, which was proclaimed on the banners which hung from every rafter: “For Zion’s sake, I will not keep silent.” They were united by their commitment to speak up on behalf of the State of Israel and for its rights to exist, to self defense, and to sovereignty.

The focus of the conference was a two-pronged message to Congress and to the Obama administration, which has recently taken Israel to task for adding housing to accommodate the natural growth in its “settlements,” while soft-peddling any criticism of Iran’s nuclear ambitions: Israel is not the obstacle to peace, and the U.S. must place crippling sanctions on Iran to stop the terror-sponsoring state from acquiring nuclear arms.

Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.) told the group, “Critics say the stumbling block [to peace in the Middle East] is settlements or Jerusalem or refugees,” “We all know the real stumbling block to peace is posed by those who vehemently deny the nation of Israel’s historical right to the land of Zion.” Democrat Shelley Berkley (D-Nev) minced no words in her criticism,  “…to pin the peace process” on the settlement issue “is absolutely foolhardy. To publicly dress down the State of Israel is a huge mistake.”  CUFI founder and chairman Pastor John Hagee forcefully summed up the message, “America is singling out Israel…Despite all of the risks Israel has taken for peace, our government is pressuring Israel to take more risks. Hello Congress, we’re putting pressure on the wrong people here. You want to get tough, get tough with the terrorists, not the only democracy in the Middle East.” The crowd responded with a thunderous ovation.

Speaker after speaker pointed to the refusal of Palestinians and Arabs to accept a Jewish state in any part of the Middle East as the cause of the sixty-one year conflict, and to Iran for escalating the terror through its proxies of Hezbollah in the north and Hamas in the south. They urged the administration not to underestimate Iran’s nuclear ambitions and the existential threat they pose to Israel and to the entire region. U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), who accepted CUFI’s Defender of Israel Award at the Tuesday Night to Honor Israel, evening, said, “The chief obstacle to peace in the Middle East is not Israelis living on the West Bank but the regime in Tehran.”

After an extravagant Night to Honor Israel, on Wednesday, CUFI delegates took the message to Capitol Hill to tell their members of Congress not pressure the Jewish state but to respect the democratic nation and work with it as a friend. Representatives were also asked to co-sponsor legislation that could strengthen the President’s hand in the event that negotiations do not prove fruitful. One bill is the Iran Refined Petroleum Sanctions Act, which would impose sanctions on companies that help Iran import or produce refined petroleum. The other bill, The Iran Sanctions Enabling Act, which authorizes state and local governments to divest from companies investing in Iran’s energy sector, never made it to the floor when it was introduced last year.

The CUFI conference sent a message not only to Congress and to the President, but also to Jews. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who addressed the conference via satellite, acknowledged that the conference marked the changing relationship of Christians and Jews. “For centuries, the relationship between Christians and Jews was marked by conflict rather than partnership and friendship, but this is changing. A new chapter in the relationship between us is now being written.” Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice-chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, in a passionate speech proclaimed that the threats Jews face today from a regime that is determined to wipe Israel off the map are fundamentally different from the threats Jews faced in 1939 because now there are “tens of millions of Christians who will not be silent and stand with the State of Israel.”

In the breakout sessions to fellow Christians, pastors addressed the skepticism of some in the Jewish community about allying with Christian Zionists because of a history of Church anti-Semitism and replacement theology (which teaches that Christians replaced Jews as the “Chosen People”). In a number of meetings, clergy warned that some Evangelicals, such as former President Jimmy Carter, are spewing anti-Semitism when they profess Replacement Theology. The pastors gave the biblical foundation for the support of Israel. It is not the conversion of Jews nor hastening the end of days, but the strongly held belief that God blesses those who bless the Jews and curses those who curse the Jews. (Genesis 12:13)

C.U.F.I., established only four years ago, now has 150,000 members who are living their belief and who have aspirations for growing to millions of voices which “are silent no more” when Jews or the Jewish State are in danger.

by Robert Maginnis   www.HumanEvents.com

Burden sharing among allies in Afghanistan is declining as the battlefield demands increase and the consequences of quitting remain unacceptable.  What should the U.S. do?

The U.S. has at least three options in Afghanistan: pull out and accept the consequences, increase our level of effort, and/or try to compel our allies to increase their contributions.  In any case, it will be years before the Afghans can take over the mission.

For the U.S., Afghanistan is a war of necessity because the former Taliban regime enabled al-Qaeda to mount the 9/11 attacks that killed almost 3,000 Americans and because many terrorist groups could quickly resume their safe haven operations from there if we fail.  Our goal is to create a self-sustaining Afghanistan able to deny safe havens to terrorists.

Quitting Afghanistan before it is ready to secure itself may be tempting but it isn’t a viable option because the consequences of failure are unacceptable.  The possible consequences include the Taliban returning to power, which could lead to a regional civil war that might destabilize nuclear-armed Pakistan and restore al-Qaeda’s safe haven.  It would also embolden jihadists and weaken regional allies.

Alternatively, the U.S. could increase its troop levels.  More troops are required because President Obama launched a counterinsurgency strategy that focuses on securing Afghanistan’s 33 million mostly rural population scattered across that Texas-size country.  He also needs the resources to develop each community to help win the population’s “hearts and minds.”

To address that formula, Obama promises to increase our troops by 21,000 personnel to 68,000 by year end.  But this increase is woefully insufficient to secure the Afghan population, even when combined with our few willing allies.  The best estimate of how many troops are needed is being determined by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the new U.S. commander in Afghanistan.  He delivers his assessment to the president next month.

McCrystal’s analysis is complicated by a number of emerging factors.  The Taliban increased by 57% its attacks over the same period last year and recent operations are encountering unforeseen resilience among Pashtun militants in western and northern Afghanistan, and even Kandahar, the country’s second largest city, is coming “under stress.”

The general also warns that the security mission and winning “hearts and minds” will be slow – translated: expect numerous troop rotations in the coming years.  “Until we hit the point where the insurgent fighters decide they cannot force us out or cannot discourage us, I think they’re likely to stay significantly,” McChrystal said.

That’s why Secretary of Defense Robert Gates cautioned, “This problem will not be over in two years.  This is, let’s be honest, a long-term commitment that we are involved in Afghanistan, if we are to ultimately be successful.”

The American public appears to accept an extended effort in Afghanistan.  A recent Gallup Poll found that 54% of Americans believe the Afghan war is going at least “moderately well,” and an April 2009 Roper Public Affairs & Media Poll found 53% of Americans approve of Obama’s decision to send more troops to Afghanistan.   But Gates cautions progress must be made in Afghanistan in the next 18 months in order to maintain public support for the mission.

Sending more troops is getting serious consideration.  Last week, Gates said he will soon decide whether to temporarily grow the army from 547,000 in order to cope with the dual wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.  His objective is to extend the “dwell time” for troops between tours of combat.  That decision could also provide the president more flexibility to increase force levels in Afghanistan if it becomes necessary.

For now, Gates is waiting on McCrystal’s review of the operation and possible troop request.  “I think there will not be a significant increase in troop levels in Afghanistan … at least probably through the end of the year,” Gates said.  However, that leaves open the possibility more troops could be sent next year after we begin accelerating our withdraw from Iraq.

Even with a larger Army, America’s military is severely stretched with 26% of the force deployed overseas.  We should ask why our allies aren’t doing more to help in Afghanistan.

The International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) is a United Nations-sanctioned coalition of 42 nations in Afghanistan to assist that government in the establishment of a secure and stable environment.  It has 61,130 personnel, of which 28,850 are Americans, and is also commanded by Gen. McChrystal.

Most of ISAF’s assigned forces are hamstrung by “78-80 caveats” imposed by their nations to restrict where their troops can be deployed or the tasks they can perform, said recently retired Gen. John Craddock, NATO’s former Supreme Allied Commander Europe.   Craddock said the caveats “… increase the risk to every service member deployed in Afghanistan and bring increased risk to mission success.”  He argues they are “… a detriment to effective command and control, unity of effort, and … command.”

Troops with too many caveats are not available for the types of counterinsurgency missions the U.S. Marines are now conducting in Helmand province.  Rather, caveat-bound ISAF troops conduct support missions and stay behind the walls of their heavily protected forward operating bases rather than embedding in Afghan villages.  Ask American warriors in Afghanistan what ISAF means and you might hear something like “I Saw Americans Fight.”

Only a few ISAF countries like Canada, Denmark, Netherlands, Britain, and Australia are “in the fight” with the Americans.   Other NATO members, notably Germany and France, avoid danger by operating in the country’s relatively safe north and west.

The lack of sufficient NATO fighters to augment American forces undermines Obama’s troop intensive counterinsurgency strategy.  Recently, Gen. Craddock said he failed to find a NATO ally willing to replace 2,000 U.S. Marines now conducting counterinsurgency operations in war-torn South Afghanistan and scheduled to leave in November.

Unfortunately, the lack of NATO fighters will get worse.  The Dutch plan to give up the lead role in Uruzgan province next year and Canada intends to bring its troops home from Kandahar by 2011.

Ultimately, Obama’s strategy rests on the hope that the Afghan National Army (ANA) will quickly become large and competent enough to relieve coalition forces.  But the ANA is unlikely to be capable of that mission for several years. Today, the ANA has 89,500 personnel and the plan is to increase it to 134,000 by the end of 2011.

A 2009 Rand Corporation study sponsored by the Pentagon concludes “… the ANA is a long way from being able to assume primary responsibility for Afghanistan’s security.”  The study states it will be “a matter of years” before the ANA is capable of securing the country and even then “some form of security assistance will have to continue for the foreseeable future.”

The Afghanistan war will be long and any further increase in fighters should come from caveat-free stingy allies and/or the maturing ANA.  The last resort for additional forces should be America and only after President Obama makes a convincing case that Afghanistan is worth more sacrifice.

By Steven Emerson, www.JewishWorldReview.com

Sharia would replace the U.S. Constitution

Hizb ut-Tahrir (HT), the international movement to re-establish an international Islamic state, or Caliphate, kicked off a new campaign to win American recruits Sunday July 19, 2009 in the Chicago suburb of Oak Lawn.

Nearly 300 people packed the Grand Ballroom of the Hilton Hotel for its Khalifah Conference on “The Fall of Capitalism and the Rise of Islam” to listen to HT ideologues blame capitalism for World War I and World War II; the U.S. subprime mortgage meltdown; the current violence in Iraq and Afghanistan; world poverty and malnutrition, and inner-city drug use.

A speaker identified as Abu Atallah even blamed capitalism for the late singer Michael Jackson’s decision “to shed his black skin.”

Hizb ut-Tahrir aims to restore the Caliphate that existed during the Ottoman Empire in Turkey. Turkish leader Kemal Ataturk abolished it in 1924 in an effort to create a secular, Europeanized state.

Security at the conference was very tight. Oak Lawn police maintained a checkpoint outside the Hilton, and local police and HT’s own security people had a substantial presence inside the hotel. In the ballroom where the conference took place, men and women were largely segregated, with men in the front and women in the back. This became a significant point of contention between HT supporters and several members of the audience who objected to this arrangement. At one point, an unidentified Hizb ut-Tahrir speaker became flustered over this line of questioning.

“Men and women,” he blurted out, must be kept separate “to prevent people from behaving like animals.”

A woman in the audience responded: “How does intermingling between men and women make you animals?” HT panelists didn’t have a persuasive answer, and soon adjourned that session.

The conference was sometimes poorly organized. There was no list of speakers, forcing reporters to sometimes guess at the spelling of speakers’ names. But HT certainly appeared to be serious about working for the larger goals of the conference: abolishing capitalism and imposing Caliphate rule over the world.

According to Hizb ut-Tahrir, the world’s social and economic problems will not be fixed until the world is governed by Sharia and the government controls all major industries. Lenders would no longer be able to charge interest, which one speaker decried as a “poisonous concept.” Charity, or zakat, was advertised as the way to alleviate “economic inequality.”

“Secular capitalism has made me devalue my skin” and “has kept my family in ghettos,” said one speaker, an African-American who went on to blame it for the fact that he smoked marijuana and his grandmother played the lottery. Capitalism, he added, is a form of economic “terrorism” and “causes us to be sent to mental hospitals.” Barack Obama’s presidency, he said, “is only a scheme or con” to trick people into thinking that things will get better under capitalism.

But time and again on Sunday, Hizb ut-Tahrir officials seemed to be playing slippery rhetorical games of their own — particularly when it came to the behavior of despotic Muslim regimes and terrorists. When a few skeptical audience members pressed speakers over the fact that Islamic governments in Iran and Saudi Arabia are despotic, conference speakers claimed those weren’t “authentic” Muslim governments and that the CIA (and by implication, the capitalist U.S. government) was to blame for the problems in those countries. In an interview with WBBM-TV in Chicago, HT deputy spokesman Mohammad Malkawi refused to specifically condemn Al Qaida and the Taliban.

Hizb ut-Tahrir has not been designated a terrorist group by the U.S. government and it insists it is only interested in instituting radical change by nonviolent means. But HT’s alumni include 9/ll mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the late Iraqi terrorist leader Abu Musab Zarqawi and would-be Hamas suicide bombers, and the group’s pro-jihadist rhetoric has led critics to label it a “conveyor belt for terrorists.”

HT’s efforts to rehabilitate its image won’t be helped by the menacing tone on display Sunday. One late-afternoon panelist suggested that modern industrial powers could fall to Muslims the way Mecca fell to Mohammed (without a fight) nearly 1,400 years ago.

A speaker identified by conference organizers as Imam Jaleel Abdul Adil said that “if they offer us the sun, or the moon, or a nice raise, or a passport, or a house in the suburbs or even a place to pray at the job, on the condition that we stop calling for Islam as a complete way of life — we should never do that, ever do that — unless and until Islam becomes victorious or we die in the attempt.”

Later, the following dialogue ensued between the imam and a member of the audience over whether Sharia or the Constitution should be the supreme law of the land in the United States:

Audience member: “Would you get rid of the Constitution for Sharia, yes or no?”

Imam: “Over the Muslim world? Yes, it would be gone.”

Audience Member: And so if the United States was a Muslim world, the Constitution would be gone?”

Imam: “If the United States was in the Muslim world, the Muslims who are here would be calling and happy to see the Sharia applied, yes we would.”

Audience Member: “And the Constitution gone. That’s all.”

Imam: “Yes, as Muslims they would be long gone.”

While Hizb ut-Tahrir’s controversial message attracted demonstrators and some media attention, the group at least is open about its ambitions. It not only is determined to destroy capitalism — it would shred the United States Constitution as well in favor of Sharia law.

By Ronald Kessler, www.NewsMax.com

Reaction to President Obama’s speech to a Muslim audience in Cairo in early June has drawn a range of reaction from many Jewish leaders. Detractors condemned it as a revision of the long and close relationship between the U.S. and Israel. But many who backed Obama were also surprised and dismayed over Obama’s speech. Such reactions from major Jewish leaders have largely remained beneath the surface, exchanged privately among them.

Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, spoke out. “I have no problem with addressing the Muslim world. We here at the conference have done it for about 12 or 15 years. But the question is, what is the message they get? It’s not so much what he says, but how do they perceive what he says?”

On the one hand, Hoenlein says, “His reference to Israel and the special relationship being unbreakable is important, and references to persecution and Holocaust denial were important.”

But Hoenlein is disturbed that Obama did not mention the Jewish people’s ancient connection with the land of Israel. “There was no reference to the 3,000 years of Jewish connection to this land,” he says. “And that is one of the propaganda lines that the Arabs use: that the Jews are interlopers, that the two Temples never existed, that there was never any Jewish history in Israel. I don’t believe that was the president’s intent, but not making those references is troubling.”

Jews have claimed a connection to the land of their forefathers since 1400 B.C. Even after the Roman destruction of the Second Temple in 70 A.D., many Jews continued to reside in Jerusalem through the centuries, surviving various invasions. An 1845 Ottoman census of Jerusalem showed Jews outnumbered Muslim Arabs by almost 2 to 1 and were the dominant ethnic group in the region.

In his speech, President Obama addressed the issue of the Holocaust head-on, saying “Six million Jews were killed — more than the entire Jewish population of Israel today.” But he quickly changed the subject, comparing Hitler’s genocide of the Jews to the Palestinian struggle.

Hoenlein doesn’t buy Obama’s line of reasoning. “The Palestinian refugee problem, or dislocation as he said, didn’t come about because of the creation of the Jewish state,” Hoenlein says. “It came about because the Arab states declared war on Israel and warned the Arabs that they would suffer the same fate as the Jews if they didn’t get out. And then they kept them as political pawns. The reason the Palestinians don’t have a state is because their leaders rejected every offer for peace. Whether it was in 1937 or 1947 or 1967, or later on, up until Ehud Olmert’s offer and Ehud Barak’s offer, they rejected everything, even when they were getting virtually everything they had asked for.”

That is because, “The problem really is not what Israel does, it’s that Israel is,” Hoenlein says. “And they’re not ready to accept the existence of the Jewish state.”

Obama also failed to mention the other refugee problem involving nearly a million Jews. In 1948, Jews populated the major Arab cities from Baghdad in the east to Casablanca in the west. After Israel saw its rebirth, Jews “were driven out of Arab countries penniless, and some of their families had lived there for a thousand years, and yet there was no reference to them.” Hoenlein adds, “It’s a question of the realities that are communicated to a vast audience in the Arab Muslim world.”

By Gil Ronen, www.IsraelNationalNews.com)

The Israeli Air Force’s F-15 fleet is undergoing an upgrade, with systems that make it better equipped for complex long-distance attack scenarios. The systems are being installed in both the F-15 and the F-15I — a model of the F-15 that was developed by its U.S. manufacturer specifically for the IAF.

According to Israel Defense Forces (IDF) journal BaMachaneh, the F-15I model is currently being fitted with two new systems – one called “Barad Pelada” (“Steel Hail”), and another named Lightning.

The Barad Pelada advanced weapons system has been operational in the IAF’s F-16s for almost four years, but had to be modified in order to fit the F-15.

Barad Pelada is an advanced Israeli armament that operates like a smart bomb. “The system is unique in that it is able to plan the bombing in an accurate way by identifying the target from above,” a knowledgeable source in the IAF explained. “After the identification, the system carries out guidance to the target and only then is impact made.”

The Lightning advanced attack system has also been in use in the IAF’s other jets. Until now, the F-15I jets had to rely on the older Inbar system, which used to be fitted in all of the IAF’s jets but was gradually phased out.

The Inbar system is capable of providing an operational solution in some ranges, but other attack scenarios require advanced systems like the Lightning, IAF sources said. “The need for the new system led to an accelerated procedure of development of advanced means,” a source in the IAF’s Weapons Department explained. “Once the testing at the Flight Experiment Center is finished, we will complete the system’s integration in the aircraft.”

A combination of two systems

For the time being, however, the F-15I jets will not part with the older Inbar systems. “From now on, the aircraft will enjoy a combination of both attack systems and will enjoy a meaningful advantage in their operational activity,” the sources said.

The F-15 jets, meanwhile, recently received a new weapon system named “Barad Kaved” (“Heavy Hail”) and used it for the first time during operation “Cast Lead” in Gaza in early 2009. IAF sources said the use was a success. The F-15 fighters used Barad Kaved in attacks with zero malfunctions, and “we are very pleased with its performance in the operation,” the sources said.

Sharp as a razor

“The reelection of Iran’s president, his grave utterances regarding his will to harm the state of Israel, and Iran’s continual effort to achieve unconventional weapons require us to maintain an army that is coiled and ready to spring into action, and an air force that is skilled and sharp as a razor, that will stand up to any enemy and remove any threat from our citizens and residents,“ IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi said at the Hatzerim Air Force Base.

Ilan Halimi in captivity

Ilan Halimi in happier days

Tender French Justice for the Gang of Barbarians

By Nidra Poller

http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com

In a show of disrespect for the family of Ilan Halimi, victim of the most atrocious anti-Semitic crime committed in France since World War II, the court announced the verdict after 10 PM on Friday night—the Sabbath—on the eve of the July 4th holiday weekend. Emma, the young lady who lured 23 year-old Halimi into the cruel trap was sentenced to nine years in prison. Youssouf Fofana, the “Brain of the Barbarians,” who admits he finished off his Jewish victim, after 24 days of torture, stabbing him five times and setting him aflame, gets “life” in prison (with a possibility of parole after 22 years). The other 25 accomplices or accessories were given jail terms ranging from acquittal to 18 years. The motive of anti-Semitism was retained for some of the defendants, but did not incur the corresponding ten-year increase in jail terms. Two men who played a key role in the Halimi kidnapping are on the loose because the police couldn’t persuade any of the defendants to cough up their names.

The two-month trial was held behind closed doors in juvenile court because two of the defendants were just under 18 when the crime was committed. Ruth Halimi, the victim’s mother, pleaded in vain for an open hearing. In January 2006 she had vainly entreated investigators to recognize the anti-Semitic motive of her son’s jailers. For 24 days the police followed false trails, overlooked clues, missed chances to nab the mastermind, and bungled negotiations for unrealistic ransom demands that were little more than a pretext for the torture inflicted on Ilan Halimi. The photo sent to the family the day after his disappearance tells it all: Ilan’s face is totally plastered with thick silver duct tape. His eyes and mouth are sealed shut, leaving a small hole for his broken nose.

He was kept naked—first in an unheated apartment, then in a boiler room—fed liquids through a straw, forced to eliminate in a plastic bag, beaten, kicked, pummeled… No one will ever know the extent of his ordeal. Playing on the nuances of French law that supposedly establishes the exact degree of participation of each individual in a collective crime, defense lawyers portrayed their clients as lost sheep haplessly involved in a seemingly normal short-term business enterprise…even when it became obvious that the whole thing was bungled and only the torture was real.

Late Friday afternoon, the press, alerted by rumors that the verdict would be pronounced before nightfall, stood for hours in the halls of the Palais de Justice before being admitted into the antiquated courtroom. The atmosphere was weirdly festive, as defense lawyers chatted with each other and fussed over their clients, half-hidden from our view behind a glassed-in cubicle. It was after 10 PM when the presiding judge finally announced—in a barely audible voice— prison terms for the 27 defendants, from life to 18 years, to 15, 13, 11 and by even increments all the way to six months suspended sentence and, for two of them, acquittal. Most prisoners are released in France after serving half their terms.

The whole thing has been hushed up and tucked away under front page stories about holiday traffic jams and the Tour de France bicycle race. Last week Maître Francis Szpiner, representing the Halimi family, expressed his misgivings about the indulgent recommendations to the jury of the Avocat Général—a sort of voice of the people and the Bench. Interviewed Friday night after the lenient verdict was announced, Szpiner called upon the Minister of Justice to appeal (the plaintiffs do not have the right to appeal). Several Jewish organizations have called for a gathering Monday night in front of the Justice Ministry at Place Vendôme…at the same place where enraged Islamists shouting “Death to Israel, Death to the Jews” made a show of force in January.

Background:

France’s Private Concentration Camp

By Jamie Glazov, www.FrontPageMagazine.com, Friday, June 26, 2009

Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Pamela Geller, founder, editor and publisher of the popular and award-winning weblog Atlas Shrugs.com. She has won acclaim for her interviews with internationally renowned figures, including John Bolton, Geert Wilders, Bat Ye’or, Natan Sharansky, and many others, and has broken numerous important stories — notably the questionable sources of some of the financing of the Obama campaign. Her op-eds have been published in The Washington Times, The American Thinker, Israel National News, Front Page Magazine, World Net Daily, and New Media Journal, among other publications.

FP: Pamela Geller, welcome to Frontpage Interview.

Geller: Thank you for having me Jamie.

You’ve been following the trial of the torture and murder of a young Jewish man, Ilan Halimi, in Paris. Tell us about the case and the trial.

Geller: The death of Ilan Halimi can only be described as an unspeakable horror, and yet typical of the increasing Islamic Jew-hatred and violence against the Jews. A group calling itself the Muslim Barbarians targeted Jewish men for torture and murder. Their first attempts to kidnap a Jew were unsuccessful, despite the lure of a beautiful girl. Ilan Halimi was not so lucky. He did not escape the Islamic homemade concentration camp the Muslim Barbarians had set up.

The banality of evil lived in that apartment building. Apartment dwellers, all Muslims, heard Ilan’s screams and cries of torture over a period of three weeks, and yet did not call the cops. The screams must have been loud because the torture was especially atrocious: the thugs cut bits of flesh off the young man. They cut his fingers and ears. They burned him with acid. They poured flammable liquid on him and set him on fire. Not only did those in the building not go to the police — they did nothing at all. Worse, many took part in the tortures.

So systemic is the Jew hatred in France that it impeded rescuing Ilan or securing his release. Halimi’s family said that throughout Ilan’s entire captivity, the French police refused to move on any of the evidence that pointed to an anti-Semitic motive. Instead, the police conducted a routine kidnap investigation (which invariably involves ransom, not death). The police refused to pursue the anti-Semitic motivations of the kidnappers in spite of the fact that, according to newspaper accounts, “in their e-mail and telephone communications with Ilan’s family, his captors repeatedly referred to his Judaism, and on at least one occasion recited verses from the Koran while Ilan was heard screaming in agony in the background”.

The family begged the police to listen to torturous phone calls from the kidnappers and acknowledge that Ilan was abducted because he was Jewish. Clearly, had the police not acted in judeophobic fashion, they would have recognized that Ilan’s life was in terrible danger and taken urgent action. But law enforcement was not the only guilty party. The government refused to acknowledge the anti-Semitic motives behind the torture and killing a full week after the Halimi turned up mutilated and dead.

This was not new, of course. In 2003, Sebastian Sellam, a popular disc jockey at a hot Parisian night club called Queen known as DJ Lam C (a reverse play on his surname) was on his way to work when in an underground parking lot, a Muslim neighbor slit Sellam’s throat twice. His face was completely mutilated with a carving fork. Even his eyes were gouged out.

It has taken three years to bring this case to trial and even now, they are hiding their dirty little secrets behind closed doors.

FP: How come this trial is not receiving any attention or coverage?

Geller: The French would like this ugly little business to go away. Like Al Dura. Like

their sordid national behavior when the Nazis occupied France.

The latest outrage in the closed (more like hidden) trial of the “Muslim barbarian” ringleader Fofana and his 26 accomplices (it was more like 50) in the savage torture and murder of Ilan Halimi is suspension of the trial, with no indication of when it will begin again. Why isn’t Youssouf Fofana, in a glass box like Eichmann at Nuremberg, chained like the wild animal that he is?

In a shocking display of proud Islamic Jew hatred (consistent with the most sacred teachings of the Koran), the brutal Halimi murder trial was suspended after the defendant spewed vile invectives and threw his “Arab shoes” across the courtroom at the jury. Throwing shoes at someone is a powerful insult in the Arab world.

According to a prosecution lawyer, Fofana’s shoe throwing occurred during the presentation of evidence by doctors who examined Halimi’s body.

It is not clear when the hearing would be resumed. The trial is being conducted behind closed doors, with no press or public allowed, at the request of two of the defendants who were minors at the time of the killing. The trial is closed at the request of barbarians so evil, so savage that it defies the normal mind. And yet the vichy French acquiesced to the Muslim nazis and are hiding their pathetic attempt at justice behind closed doors.

The silence in the media and across the world is a crime against humanity. Imagine, if you will, the unthinkable, the impossible — if Ilan had been a Muslim and his attackers had been Jews. Stop laughing — I know it is impossible, but that’s not my point. This is damning proof of the Jew hatred that is running wild across the world. Israel shuts a light off in Gaza and the world wants to eliminate her. Imagine if Ilan had been black and his attackers had been white. Stop and think about it.

FP: So let’s dig a bit deeper here: why did the police turn a blind eye to the evidence indicating that Islamic anti-Semitism was behind the kidnapping? Why is the French government, law enforcement and the media now covering up why this horrifying crime was committed? Better to let a Jew get tortured and killed than to point to the truth about what Islam teaches and what many Muslims believe and are ready to act upon, yes? This is Jew-Hate and a surrender to Islam simultaneously, yes?

Geller: Yes, exactly. This is a strain of anti-Semitism in Europe that has never been eradicated. There is never any discussion of Islamic anti-Semitism, and it is fundamental to Islamic teachings. This refusal to acknowledge the obvious gives tacit approval to incitement to violence. It is unsafe to walk about many European cities with any identifying Jewish apparel or accessories on. Is that what Europe learned from World War II? Is that the lesson that Europe took away from the holocaust?

The lesson that Europe had decided to avail itself of in the aftermath of Auschwitz was not that evil is bad and that they behaved like monsters, but rather that everything was caused by nationalism — and therefore, what they really needed to do was have a European Union that would obviate their need for nationalism, so that they could become this transnational gobbletygook. They’d all get together and therefore they wouldn’t have another Auschwitz.
But really the lesson should have been that they were evil and they had to be good. And that is the lesson they still have to learn. You have to be able and willing to make moral distinctions and stand up for the good and fight evil, and that is something the Europeans refuse to do.

They are constantly having memorials to dead Jews, while condemning Israel for every act of self defense, no matter how benign it is, in the defense of innocent Jewish citizens.

Ilan Halimi best demonstrates the horror of this lack of humanity. But certainly the “death to Jews” rallies that spread like a cancer across the Europe (and major US cities) during the Gaza defensive in January is certainly a gross demonstration of this evil.

FP: What are your own personal thoughts on this case?

Geller: It is an indescribable horror. Unimaginable. It demonstrates the free hand Jew hatred is given. It was not just the Muslims that reveled in the torture of this young Jewish man; it was law enforcement’s response (or lack of it), and the circus-like atmosphere of the trial. It is a stunning indictment of French society. Flagrant and unabashed hatred.

FP: What can ordinary citizens do to try to bring some kind of justice to this horrifying crime and to expose the shameless, hateful and cowardly behavior of French authorities and the media etc?

Geller: Speak up! Write, call, email, fax media and elected officials. Burke was right when he said all that is necessary for evil to succeed is for good men to do nothing. Speak up! Evil is made possible by thesanction you give it. Withdraw your sanction (channeling Ayn Rand here).

FP: What do we get from the reality that this happened, as you relate, in an apartment building where myriad dwellers, all Muslims, heard Ilan’s screams and cries of torture and did not only did nothing but came to participate? This wasn’t a secret between three people. Dozens and dozens of people knew about this, and supported and engaged in it. What does it tell us?

Could it possibly have something to do with the Islamic theological teaching about not only the importance of hating and killing Jews, but also that a Muslim will go to heaven if he kills a Jew?

Hmmm I wonder.

The liberal and leftist milieus cannot accept what it tells us of course, but they know there would never be a reverse situation (i.e. an apartment building full of Jews who hear a Muslim screaming from being tortured and they support it and participate in it, etc.). And if this did happen, which it wouldn’t, imagine the media being completely silent about it.

Geller: This is the terrible truth about Islam, well documented in Dr. Andrew Bostom’s encyclopedic tome,The Legacy of Islamic Antisemitism. The Islamic dehumanization of the Jews mirrors what the Nazis did during the Hlocaust. I find it troubling in all of my research and personal dealings it is difficult to find devout Muslims (any Muslims that are not apostates) who are not hostile to Israel. It speaks volumes. And of course, none of this would be possible if the Left were not aligning itself with political Islam. But this is consistent with the modus operandi of the left. Historically they align themselves with the totalitarian ideology du jour.

FP: Pamela Geller, thank you for joining Frontpage Interview.

CIRCLE VISION: A burqa's three-inch-wide mesh screen creates a circular grid through which a woman sees herself as a specter in a bathroom mirror. SARA TERRY

UNIQUE PEEK: A cell phone camera hidden under a burqa gives a unique view of the streets of Kabul. SARA TERRY

 By Sara Terry, The Christian Science Monitor, www.csmonitor.com

 KABUL, AFGHANISTAN –As odd as it may sound, I thought that a burqa might be the answer to my problems. Here on a five-week assignment to shoot photos for a humanitarian organization, I was dismayed to realize that I wasn’t going to be able to move freely. There was a standing threat against Western women working for aid organizations — prime targets for kidnapping and sale to the Taliban. Understandably enough, the organization restricted my movements, rarely allowing me out on the street unless I was in a car — and never allowing me to go anywhere alone.

My exasperation grew as I discovered that even when I could go out, I couldn’t take a step without being the center of attention. It wasn’t unfriendly attention; I actually never felt unsafe or threatened. It’s just that wherever I went, everyone watched me. Heads swiveled the moment I stepped out of the car. People were curious about the presence of a foreigner, and even more so when I held up my camera. In other words, the pictures I love to make — street scenes and moments of gesture and interaction between people, all taken as if I’d had gone unnoticed — were impossible.

 So, I began eyeing those voluminous blue burqas, still ubiquitous in Kabul. I wondered if I could “hide” underneath one and find a way to work comfortably on the street.

 The irony didn’t escape me — looking for a measure of freedom in a garment that had come to symbolize the brutal repression of women during the Taliban era.

 At my request, my driver asked his wife to find a burqa for me. He delivered it early one morning, and I hurried upstairs, threw it over my head, went straight to the bathroom mirror, and made the first of several discoveries. The burqa has an oddly comforting quality at first — reminiscent of the cozy intrigue of a kid hiding in a makeshift tent under the dining room table. But it’s also hot and stuffy. It’s tricky to walk in because it allows no peripheral vision and catches on things like bushes and doorknobs. And the headpiece is so tight that it’s impossible to shoot with a regular camera from inside — there’s only an inch or two of space between one’s eyes and the mesh screen that hides the face.

So I picked up my cell phone and slipped it up between my nose and the mesh. I began with the most obvious pictures of all — self-portraits in the bathroom mirror.

I’d seen many pictures of women in burqas, but here was a whole new point of view – pictures from inside the burqa.

I was eager to see if my theory of anonymity would work on the streets of Kabul. But I didn’t get past the front door. My driver and the organization’s security officials objected, arguing that I’d be immediately identifiable as a foreigner — by my shoes and the way I walk — and that the police would suspect that I was trying to hide something.

Thwarted, I still couldn’t let the idea go. So I took the burqa with me in a bag everywhere I went, looking for moments when my driver would let me wear it. At the Mughal garden I clumsily threw the burqa over my head — there’s a trick to writhing through yards of fabric to find the three-inch-wide spot for your eyes. When I stood up in it from the back of our SUV, my long-suffering driver looked at me and smiled and said, “You look nice.”

I nearly fell over – both from the disorienting tiny mesh screen and amazement at what I’d just heard. “But, Abdullah,” I countered. “You can’t see me. How can you possibly say I look nice?”

He smiled and turned away.

 I wore the burqa whenever I could — in the park, the countryside, a bazaar. Stumbling, at first, and coping with the uncomfortable confinement of the cheap polyester, I took pictures of the world around me, through a veil that for many Afghan women is the way the public world is seen every minute of every day.

I took my burqa to Bamiyan, where the Taliban in 2001 dynamited the ancient Buddha statues carved into sandstone cliffs. I walked up a short incline and threw on the burqa, and heard one of the local guides shout up to me, “Can you see?”

I turned around, covered in the robe. “Of course, I can’t see anything,” I yelled back. “I’m wearing a burqa.” Later, I assured the four men who’d accompanied me that if men had to wear burqas, there’d soon be no burqas in Afghanistan.

In the end, I made a series of photos I call “Circle Vision,” because of the way the circles in the burqa mesh screen divide up the field of vision. For me, they ultimately came to represent little intersecting boundaries that remind me of the many woven boundaries encircling the lives of Afghan women every day.

It was the briefest of encounters with their world — but an enlightening one. I saw a bit of what they see, and learned, in surprising ways, what it means to be seen inside a burqa.

I was, in fact, stopped by the police — twice. They wanted to know who I was and why I was wearing a burqa; each time, my guides explained I was just interested in seeing the world the way Afghan women do, so that I could share it back home.

The last day I wore my burqa, I’d been out in the neighborhood with one of the security guards, an educated young man who’d told me a lot about his life, including the fact that he had many girlfriends and no plans to marry. When I took the deep-blue burqa off for the last time, I turned to see the young man smiling. “You look good in a burqa,” he said, much to my astonishment. “You put that on again, and I just might pop the question.”

An Egyptian patrol ship navigates in the Suez Canal

By Samer al-Atrush, Agence France-Presse

 CAIRO (AFP) — Egyptian security forces have arrested 26 suspected Al-Qaeda loyalists on charges of plotting attacks on foreign ships passing through the Suez Canal, the interior ministry said today.

 The suspects, 25 Egyptians and a Palestinian, were in contact with the Al-Qaeda-linked Islamic Army of Palestine, the ministry said in a statement.

 It alleged that they had prepared remote controlled detonators and explosives fabricated from armaments left over in the Sinai desert from Egypt’s wars with Israel.

 The cell was awaiting instructions from abroad from an Al-Qaeda operative, the statement said.

 It also charged that the cell carried out a deadly armed robbery of a Coptic Christian-owned jewelry shop in Cairo in May 2008 in which the owner and four workers were killed. The gun used in the attack had also been found.

 Five suspects “gave detailed confessions on carrying out (the attack)… to fund their activities,” it said.

 In May, the interior ministry said it had arrested seven members of another alleged Al-Qaeda-affiliated cell over a bombing in Cairo’s Khan el-Khalili bazaar that killed a teenage French tourist.

 The suspects included an alleged French ringleader of Albanian origin, a dual British and Egyptian national and a Belgian man of Tunisian descent.

 Dozens of students from Russian Muslim republics were deported after the bombing.

 Egypt expelled 20 French men earlier this month after they were arrested on suspicion of having had contact with the cell that carried out the Khan el-Khalili bombing.

 That cell called itself the Army of Islam of Palestine, according to the interior ministry, and was led by two Egyptians living abroad, one of them reportedly in the Gaza Strip.

 In April, the Egyptian public prosecutor said that 49 people had been charged with forming a Hezbollah cell suspected of planning attacks on tourist resorts and ships passing through the Suez Canal.

 Twenty-five of these were under arrest and the others remained at large.

 Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of the Lebanese Shiite militant group, said one of those arrested was a Hezbollah agent but insisted he had been involved in smuggling weapons to Gaza rather than plotting attacks inside Egypt itself.

 Egypt was hit by a spate of bombings in Sinai tourist resorts between 2004 and 2006, which killed dozens of foreign tourists and Egyptians.

 The government responded with a severe crackdown against Bedouin living in the Sinai, with thousands arrested. Human rights groups said at the time police arrested suspects without warrants and tortured some of them in detention.

www.americanthinker.com

Uzi Mahnaimi and Sarah Baxter of www.TimesOnline.co.uk are reporting that Israeli defense officials have assured Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Saudi Arabia would look the other way if Israeli warplanes flew over the Kingdom on their way to Iran.

Or, at least, they might have. Now that the information has been leaked, it is doubtful that the Royals would risk the backlash from their fundamentalist base:

 Earlier this year Meir Dagan, Mossad’s director since 2002, held secret talks with Saudi officials to discuss the possibility.

The Israeli press has already carried unconfirmed reports that high-ranking officials, including Ehud Olmert, the former prime minister, held meetings with Saudi colleagues. The reports were denied by Saudi officials.

“The Saudis have tacitly agreed to the Israeli air force flying through their airspace on a mission which is supposed to be in the common interests of both Israel and Saudi Arabia,” a diplomatic source said last week.

Although the countries have no formal diplomatic relations, an Israeli defence source confirmed that Mossad maintained “working relations” with the Saudis.

John Bolton, the former US ambassador to the United Nations who recently visited the Gulf, said it was “entirely logical” for the Israelis to use Saudi airspace.

Bolton, who has talked to several Arab leaders, added: “None of them would say anything about it publicly but they would certainly acquiesce in an overflight if the Israelis didn’t trumpet it as a big success.”

Arab states would condemn a raid when they spoke at the UN but would be privately relieved to see the threat of an Iranian bomb removed, he said.

 Bolton is absolutely correct. The Saudis would not mind at all if Iran’s nuclear threat were to disappear. The same goes for any other sane regime in the Middle East. No one wants Iran to get the bomb  – not with that crew in charge in Tehran.

But it is now an open question whether the royal family could actually allow such overflights. It would certainly rile the Wahabbists [sic] who wield great influence with ordinary Saudis and that might endanger the family’s hold on power. If the overflights had occurred without advance warning, they could have feigned surprise. That option is now out the window.

Still, the threat is so great they may yet allow the Israeli air force to traverse their air space without saying anything.

By Michael Slackman And Nazila Fathi, www.NYTimes.com

CAIRO — The most important group of religious leaders in Iran called the disputed presidential election and the new government illegitimate on Saturday, an act of defiance against the country’s supreme leader and the most public sign of a major split in the country’s clerical establishment.

A statement by the group, the Association of Researchers and Teachers of Qum, represents a significant, if so far symbolic, setback for the government and especially the authority of the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, whose word is supposed to be final. The government has tried to paint the opposition and its top presidential candidate, Mir Hussein Moussavi, as criminals and traitors, a strategy that now becomes more difficult — if not impossible.

“This crack in the clerical establishment, and the fact they are siding with the people and Moussavi, in my view is the most historic crack in the 30 years of the Islamic republic,” said Abbas Milani, director of the Iranian Studies Program at Stanford University. “Remember, they are going against an election verified and sanctified by Khamenei.”

The announcement came on a day when Mr. Moussavi released documents detailing a campaign of fraud by the current president’s supporters, and as a close associate of the supreme leader called Mr. Moussavi and former President Mohammad Khatami “foreign agents,” saying they should be treated as criminals.

The documents, published on Mr. Moussavi’s Web site, accused supporters of the president of printing more than 20 million extra ballots before the vote and handing out cash bonuses to voters.

Since the election, the bulk of the clerical establishment in the holy city of Qum, an important religious and political center of power, has remained largely silent, leaving many to wonder when, or if, the nation’s most senior religious leaders would jump into the controversy that has posed the most significant challenge to the country’s leadership since the Islamic Revolution.

With its statement Saturday, the association of clerics — formed under the leadership of the revolution’s founder, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini — came down squarely on the side of the reform movement.

The association includes reformists, but Iranian political analysts describe it as independent, and it did not support any candidate in the recent election.

The group had earlier asked for the election to be nullified because so many Iranians objected to the results, but it never directly challenged the legitimacy of the government and, by extension, the supreme leader.

The earlier statement also came before the election was certified by the country’s religious leaders, who have since said that opposition to the results must cease.

The clerics’ decision to speak up again is not itself a turning point and could fizzle under pressure from the state, which has continued to threaten its critics. Some seminaries in Qum rely on the government for funds, and Ayatollah Khamenei and the man he has declared the winner of the election, incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have powerful backers there.

They also retain the support of the powerful security forces and the elite Revolutionary Guards. In addition, the country’s highest-ranking clerics have yet to speak out individually against the election results.

But the association’s latest statement does help Mr. Moussavi, Mr. Khatami and a former speaker of Parliament, Mehdi Karroubi, who have been the most vocal in calling the election illegitimate and who, in their attempts to force change, have been hindered by the jailing of influential backers.

“The significance is that even within the clergy, there are many who refuse to recognize the legitimacy of the election results as announced by the supreme leader,” said an Iranian political analyst who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.

While the government could continue vilifying the three opposition leaders, analysts say it was highly unlikely that the leadership would use the same tactic against the clerical establishment in Qum.

The backing also came at a sensitive time for Mr. Moussavi, because the accusations that he is a foreign agent ran in a newspaper, Kayhan, that has often been used to build cases against critics of the government.

The editorial was written by Hossein Shariatmadari, who was picked by the supreme leader to run the newspaper.

The clerics’ statement chastised the leadership for failing to adequately study complaints of vote rigging and lashed out at the use of force in crushing huge public protests.

It even directly criticized the Guardian Council, the powerful group of clerics charged with certifying elections.

“Is it possible to consider the results of the election as legitimate by merely the validation of the Guardian Council?” the association said.

Perhaps more threatening to the supreme leader, the committee called on other clerics to join the fight against the government’s refusal to adequately reconsider the charges of voter fraud. The committee invoked powerful imagery, comparing the 20 protesters killed during demonstrations with the martyrs who died in the early days of the revolution and the war with Iraq, asking other clerics to save what it called “the dignity that was earned with the blood of tens of thousands of martyrs.”

The statement was posted on the association’s Web site late Saturday and carried on many other sites, including the Persian BBC, but it was impossible to reach senior clerics in the group to independently confirm its veracity.

The statement was issued after a meeting Mr. Moussavi had with the committee 10 days ago and a decision by the Guardian Council to certify the election and declare that all matters concerning the vote were closed.

But the defiance has not ended.

With heavy security on the streets, there is a forced calm. But each day, slowly, another link falls from the chain of government control. Last week, in what appeared a coordinated thrust, Mr. Moussavi, Mr. Karroubi and Mr. Khatami all called the new government illegitimate. On Saturday, Mr. Milani of Stanford said, former President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani met with families of those who had been arrested, another sign that he was working behind the scenes to keep the issue alive.

“I don’t ever remember in the 20 years of Khamenei’s rule where he was clearly and categorically on one side and so many clergy were on the other side,” Mr. Milani said. “This might embolden other clergy to come forward.”

The committee of clergy was formed in the 1960s. Mr. Milani said that for years, Ayatollah Khamenei also belonged to the group, and that it had developed some political clout by backing successful candidates for national office.

Many of the accusations of fraud posted on Mr. Moussavi’s Web site Saturday had been published before, but the report did give some more specific charges.

For instance, although the government had announced that two of the losing presidential contenders had received relatively few votes in their hometowns, the documents stated that some ballot boxes in those towns contained no votes for the two men.