Israel, the Jew of the Nations (which was causing a revolution in religion, ethics, and morality millennia before most other peoples made their historical debuts), still has to fight for its right to take its place among newcomers on the world scene.

By Gerald A. Honigman, INN

As I prepare to try to once again fill in some important gaps which too many Jewish students–let alone others–have in education prior to or during their years of anti-Israel higher indoctrination and vilification on many, if not most, campuses, Hanukkah 5779/2018 is just over and Christians are preparing for the Christmas holiday of December 25th.

This endeavor will serve as a follow-up to my last analysis with this goal in mind. That earlier one dealt with, among other things, what perhaps the greatest Muslim scholar of all time, Ibn Khaldun, had to say about both the historical Jew and the Jew of the Nations–Israel–some six centuries ago…  If I say so myself, like this current essay, the former is also just what the doctor ordered when confronting groups like SJP/Students for Justice in Palestine (which just had its annual hate Israel fest conference at UCLA as I write this), J Street U, and duplicitous “Progressive” professors who specialize in using one set of lenses to scrutinize Israel and Zionism, and an entirely different set with regard to the rest of the neighborhood.
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DEBKA

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T. Belman. I am so pleased to have a guy like Arbess promoting the Jordan Option. He is saying nothing that hasn’t been said by me over the last two years. My guess is we could both say more, but decline to do so.

By Daniel Arbess, ALGEMIENER

Jordan’s King Abdullah (left) with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in 2014. Photo: Kobi Gideon/GPO.

Last week’s Mideast security conference in Poland might have looked like a bust for the Trump administration, which hoped to consolidate European support for a harder line on Iran, and Arab support for Trump’s as-yet undisclosed “Deal of the Century” for Israeli-Palestinian peace. Neither of those things happened, but, in the process, plenty of stage-setting was accomplished.

Many European leaders stayed home, and Saudi Arabia, whose king recently stripped reformist Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) of his responsibility for the “Palestinian file,” accused Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu of misleading the Israeli people into believing that relations with Israel’s Arab neighbors would continue to improve without a resolution of the “Palestinian issue.” Other Arab leaders jumped on the bandwagon, restating their old trope that the “Palestinian issue” — not their own exploitative authoritarian and, is some cases, Islamist terror-promoting regimes — is the root cause of instability in the region.
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By E. Jeffrey Ludwig, AMERICAN THINKER

[..]

Actually, Balz’s animus, and that of the arrayed MSM anti-Trump contingent, is due to Trump’s incessant campaign against the agenda of the globalists both here and abroad.  President Trump’s insistence on the integrity of the American nation-state is profoundly at odds with the globalist mindset, which has taken over the minds/worldviews of many of those in positions of political power as well as the MSM and many of the technology gurus of Silicon Valley.  His outspoken desire to improve our border security as well as to defend against Islamic terrorism is causing the apostles of globalism to react in rage against both the man and his policies. I not only see a “derangement syndrome” but a paranoia and extraordinary flight from reality.
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By Evelyn Gordon, jns

Gaza’s health system is on the verge of collapse, Israeli defense officials warned last week. Their report echoed an international aid agency’s findings that Gaza hospitals are severely short of doctors, especially specialists, and lack 60 percent of necessary medications, including basics like painkillers and antibiotics. Entire hospital departments have closed due to the inability to offer treatment, and patients with cancer, diabetes or renal failure are simply being sent home.

You might think this situation would prompt at least one of the Palestinians’ two rival governments to take action. But you’d be wrong.

The Palestinian Authority, which repeatedly proclaims itself the sole legitimate government of both the West Bank and Gaza and is recognized as such internationally, receives billions in international aid to provide for humanitarian needs in both places. It ostensibly budgets 150 million shekels a year ($41.3 million) for medical supplies for Gaza. But it hasn’t paid this money in months.
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T. Belman. Cohen is digging the hole deeper.  Israel should be untangling itself from the PA and the UN not embracing them

By Edy Cohen, BESA

In the summer of 2005, the Israeli government, headed by PM Ariel Sharon, unilaterally disengaged from Gaza, removing thousands of Israeli residents from their homes in the Strip and transferring them to Israeli territory.

This move, which was highly controversial in view of the lack of any reciprocity from Israel’s official “peace partner,” the Palestinian Authority, was designed to bring calm to Israel’s southern border. Instead, it ushered in a sweeping victory for Hamas in the January 2006 elections, as the group was widely seen as the catalyst to the Israeli withdrawal.
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T. Belman. This is HUGE. Pres Trump should put an end to it.

JUDICIAL WATCH

The Palestinians and the Jordanians have set up a joint council for the administration of the Temple Mount and holy sites in Jerusalem.

BY JERUSALEM POST STAFF

A general view of Jerusalem’s old city shows the Dome of the Rock in the compound known to Muslims as Noble Sanctuary and to Jews as Temple Mount, October 25, 2015. (photo credit: AMIR COHEN/REUTERS)

The Palestinians and the Jordanians have set up a joint council for the administration of the Temple Mount and other Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem in an effort to preemptively torpedo the advancement of US President Donald Trump’s regional peace plan.

Yoni Ben-Menachem, a veteran Arab affairs and diplomatic commentator for Israel radio and television and a senior Middle East analyst for the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, revealed this information to Israel Hayom in an exclusive report.
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At the Munich Security Conference on Saturday, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany delivered a spirited defense of multilateral institutions in a world increasingly marked by great power rivalry.Andreas Gebert/Reuters

MUNICH — Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany delivered a strong rejoinder on Saturday to American demands that European allies pull out of the Iran nuclear deal and gave a spirited defense of multilateral institutions in a world increasingly marked by great-power rivalry.

In an uncharacteristically passionate speech, Ms. Merkel said the nuclear deal was the best way of influencing Iranian behavior on a range of non-nuclear issues, from missile development to terrorism.
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T. Belman. This is a good thing. Europe rarely did anything for the US. Trump wants to confront Iran but the EU is resiting him. Trump wants to undermine the PA and UNRWA and Erope is trying to thwart his every move. Trump is very supportive of Israel and her rights to the Jordan R. and EU is doing their best to undermine Israel and Trump. France and Germany are embracing Muslim immigration and making it a crime to criticize islam. Trump is against this. The EU can support Trump or go it alone.

By Steven Erlanger and Katrin Bennhold, NYT

Vice President Mike Pence and Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany in Munich on Saturday. She pushed back against his call for European allies to pull out of the Iran nuclear deal.Matthias Schrader/Associated Press

MUNICH — European leaders have long been alarmed that President Trump’s words and Twitter messages could undo a trans-Atlantic alliance that had grown stronger over seven decades. They had clung to the hope that those ties would bear up under the strain.

But in the last few days of a prestigious annual security conference in Munich, the rift between Europe and the Trump administration became open, angry and concrete, diplomats and analysts say.
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By Prof. Eyal Zisser, ISRAEL HAYOM

The Warsaw conference for peace and security in the Middle East in Poland doesn’t yet signal peaceful tidings for the region. The summit, which was sponsored by the United States and encouraged by Israel with the goal of establishing a regional and international coalition against Iran, was an important step toward curbing Tehran’s expansionist aspirations and terrorist subversion. Still, it was just one step on a long path ahead.

From this perspective, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was right to say during the summit that Iran can only be stopped by force, in other words with collective determination and a proactive approach – for example through painful economic sanctions or Israel’s military campaign against the Iranians and their proxies in Syria.
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Long after it had seemed that the Democrats finally had forgiven the Republicans for taking away their slaves, the new era of Democrat Hate has come.

By Rabbi Prof. Dov Fischer, INN

Pseudo-Nazis now are coming out of the woodwork in the Democrat party. To mix metaphors, it is the first bumper crop since the days of Ku Klux Klan Exalted Cyclops Robert Byrd of West Virginia.  Long after it had seemed that the Democrats finally had forgiven the Republicans for taking away their slaves, the new era of Democrat Hate has come.

In great measure, it stems from Identity Politics.  When the culture was one of encouraging a Melting Pot, a common culture, and a common language, there certainly were xenophobic “insiders” who doubted and hated the outsiders and newcomers. That always happens; every society is plagued by “Us” versus “Them.” But there also always has been a strong countervailing American trend away from xenophobia for the immigrants’ second and third generations as the children of newcomers ultimately fit in, adopting Western culture and the English language of America while becoming faithful to its Constitution.
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A study conducted by the Barna Group showed that 47% of Christian millennials believe that it is wrong to share one’s personal beliefs “in hopes they will share the same faith.”

By Zack Evans, JPOST

The vast majority of practicing Christian millennials believe that knowing Jesus is “the best thing that could happen to someone,” while nearly half believe evangelizing is wrong, a study conducted by the Barna Group reported.

In a study entitled “Reviving Evangelism,” the Barna Group, a research center that tracks faith and spirituality in American life, reported that 94% of practicing American Christian agreed that “the best thing that could ever happen to someone is for them to know Jesus.”
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By Jonathan Turley, THE HILL

Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes once said, “If my fellow citizens want to go to hell, I will help them. It is my job.” He was expressing the limited role of courts in challenges to federal law. It is not the task of judges to sit as a super legislature to question the agendas of the political branches. They will gladly send Congress to hell. It only needs to point to the destination.

In the matter of the border wall, Congress could not have been more clear where it was heading. It put itself on the path to institutional irrelevancy, and it has finally arrived. I do not agree there is a national emergency on the southern border, but I do believe President Trump will prevail. This crisis is not the making of Donald Trump. This is the making of Congress.
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By Steve Apfel, AMERICAN THINKER

A thousand American rabbis sign a petition to bring refugees carrying the Jew-hating gene into America.  Jewish bodies condemn President Trump for enacting a temporary “Muslim ban” (entirely for security reasons) on a handful of Jew-hating countries.  Jewish billionaire George Soros troubles every corner of Europe with mad visions of a border-free bloc.  American Jews take tikkun olam (repairing the world) to mean sheltering Muslims without legal papers.  Jews are for Palestinian rights — for any right that has nothing to do with Jewish rights.
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