By Yehuda Shlezinger, ISRAEL HAYOM

Two streams comprise the Ashkenazi ultra-Orthodox party United Torah Judaism: the non-Hassidic “Lithuanian” stream, represented by the Degel Hatorah faction, and the Hassidic stream, represented by the Agudat Israel faction.

It is doubtful that the average person in the street knows the difference between the two streams and between MK Moshe Gafni’s Lithuanian-style hat and Health Minister Yaakov Litzman’s Hassidic-style hat. For the average person, they are both haredim, and both should care about the haredi conscription bill, yeshiva school budgets and Shabbat observance.

However, anyone who has noticed Degel Hatorah representatives lambasting Agudat Israel members in recent weeks would perhaps be led to think the two camps are as bitter rivals as MK Bezalel Smotrich (Habayit Hayehudi) and Jamal Zahalka (Joint Arab List).
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Israel properly does not compare itself to neighboring regimes.

BY Eugene Kontorovich, JPOST

The Nation-State Basic Law brings with it serious threats to democracy. One of the consequences of the law may be the de facto disenfranchisement of not just some, but most Israel citizens.

This is not because of any provision in the Basic Law. Read the law; it does not increase or diminish the rights of any Israeli citizen. It is a modest measure that would be uncontroversial if it were passed in any other country, or by any other government.

But the critics of the new constitutional provision have turned to the Supreme Court, asking them to overturn a constitutional provision – for being unconstitutional. This makes no sense; any American constitutional lawyer would find the notion of an unconstitutional constitution ridiculous.
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Kurdish fighters vow to resist regime’s crackdown as groups search for more united strategy amid sanctions on Tehran.

BY SETH J. FRANTZMAN , JPOST

The Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said on Sunday that they had killed “10 militants” in the Kurdish region of Iran. The same day the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (PDKI) said they had engaged in “heavy clashes” with the IRGC near the city of Oshnavieh and had killed 12 “IRGC terrorists.” 

The battles come amidst a rise in tensions in Iran with US sanctions kicking in and after six months of protests in various parts of the country, including the Kurdish region. Sensing the regime is strained and the Kurdish groups are now trying to carry out more public attacks on Iran’s IRGC.
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by Daniel Pipes, MEFORUM

In Holland and Bulgaria, the creation of Turkish-Islamic political parties has created tensions between the two governments and Ankara, while Denmark is experimenting with the assimilation of migrants through imposed regulations aimed at countering feelings of alienation and marginalization. In Eastern Europe, by contrast, the conversation is mainly about the incompatibility of Christian and Muslim cultures.

Spain, Italy, and Greece have been the entry points for illegal immigration into the continent, which can be stopped should Europe display the necessary resolve. Expelling criminal migrants is possible, though it is difficult to find countries that will accept them. A far greater challenge is expelling non-criminal illegals, which Italy’s Deputy Prime Minister Salvini has pledged to do at the rate of 100,000 migrants per year over the next five years.
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Dogan Akman

Once again, the Government of Canada decided to pledge, this time around about $50 million to respond to the urgent needs of the Palestinians under the Palestinian Authority and those in Gaza.

On July 30^th, Marie Claude Bibeau Minister of International Development, stated that Canada will provide: a)$12.65 million to various international organisations such as the World Food Programme and the United Nations Children’s program  to respond to the urgent needs of the most vulnerable groups of the West Bank and Gaza, including (women) survivors of gender-based violence and people with disabilities; b) a further $37 million to four NGOs to increase the economic opportunities for Palestinians, especially for women and youth. One of these NGOs “Save Children Canada” (SCC) received $8 million over four years for its project that will help young female Palestinians builds businesses. The SCC said that the funding will address gender-based barriers to entrepreneurship.
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By Dinesh D’Souza, WESTERN JURNALISM

So the white nationalists are once again coming to Charlottesville. Get ready not only for some bombastic theatrics, but also for a replay of the progressive media’s Charlottesville narrative: Hey, look at those racists in MAGA hats! This proves that, whatever the history of Democratic Party bigotry, racism today is in the Trump column. Bigotry now is on the right.

But this narrative is a lie. First of all, no one has ever conducted a valid empirical survey of neo-Nazis or Ku Klux Klansmen to prove they voted for Trump. This is why the media needs visual images that seem to confirm an unproven thesis. In the aftermath of the initial Charlottesville, I was struck by a solitary white supremacist in a MAGA hat being interviewed by more than a dozen reporters. This one guy — otherwise culturally and politically impotent — was portrayed as visual proof that white nationalism is a malevolent Trump phenomenon.
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The Arab Israeli petition against the nation-state law, which asserts the Jews “unique” right to self-determination in Israel, reveals the false narrative behind their objection: They reject outright the Jews’ national identity and their right to the land of Israel.

By Dror Edar, ISRAEL HAYOM

The nation-state law that was legislated last month did indeed set off a seismic shift. The law, which legally defines Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people, forces the Jewish public in Israel and around the world to confront the identity of the state and the basic premise behind the entire Zionist enterprise: The return of the Jewish people to Zion and our responsibility for one another.

Do we have a historical, religious and legal right to this land? Or are we foreign occupiers who invaded someone else’s territory?

Let’s take a look at the actual wording of the Basic Law: Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People. The first article is as follows:

1 – Basic principles
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By Cillian Zeal, CONSERVATIVE TRIBUNE

China has removed crude oil from its list of items being slapped with a 25 percent tariff, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday.

It seems unusual for those used to America being an energy importer to hear about energy exports, particularly to a country as big as China. However, America’s role in petroleum production has steadily increased for quite some time now, meaning industry in China was about to feel a serious pinch.

“Over the past two years China has become the biggest buyer of U.S. crude-oil exports, last year taking a fifth of the total,” Chuin-Wei Yap wrote in the Journal.

Beijing had originally announced that oil was going to be on the list of items slapped with a 25 percent tariff issued in response to the Trump administration’s tariffs.
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By David Solway, AMERICAN THINKER

[…]

The short answer is, a lot.  Our relationship foundered over the vexed issue of redefining marriage, for my friend was gay and expected us to affirm the legalization of gay marriage in the United States and his forthcoming betrothal, as he referred to it, to his longtime partner.  This we could not do.  He objected to a rather obscure Facebook comment in which my wife deplored how the gay lobby’s justifiable plea for tolerance, with which she was fully on board, had morphed into the triumphalist demand for the unconditional celebration of all things gay, from gay politicking to Gay Pride to so-called gay marriage.

The question of religious freedom and belief, sanctioned by the Constitution, also entered into the equation.  She supported the right of a Christian baker to refuse preparing a wedding cake for a same-sex couple.  This my friend could not accept.  An email arrived accusing us of homophobia and informing us that the friendship was over.
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There is no point in being diplomatic. If Corbyn forms a government, diplomatic niceties will get us nowhere.

By Caroline B Glick, JPOST

if the current violence between Israel and the Hamas terrorist regime in Gaza escalates into a full-scale war, one thing is certain. The main thoroughfares of the West’s great cities will be filled with thousands of protesters marching in support for Hamas and its strategic goal of annihilating Israel.

The anti-Israel demonstrations this time around will dwarf all those that preceded them.

We also know with mathematical certainty that Jewish institutions and Jews will be violently assaulted from London to Melbourne, Paris to San Francisco.

Every public demonstration in support of Israel, indeed, every public demonstration of Judaism, including Jewish people walking to synagogue on Shabbat – will become a focal point for attacks.
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By Dogan Akman 

On November 16, 2016 the Minister of International Development, Marie Claude Bibeau of the Liberal government of Justin Trudeau, in power since October 19, 2015, announced that the government had reversed the 2010 decision of the preceding the Conservative government led by Stephen Harper that cancelled Canada’s annual contribution of $25 million to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).

A portion of these monies contributes to the financing, as the Minister put it, of the schooling of “vulnerable Palestinian refugees” attending UNWRA schools.  The reinstatement of this contribution occurred in the midst of allegations that UNWRA it is tied too closely to Hamas, which Canada designates as a terrorist organisation, and despite the well substantiated evidence that the textbooks used by UNWRA and published by the P.A are toxic in their treatment of Israel. Read more…

If support for the Jewish state is declining, it may have more to do with American Jews than the Israelis they claim to deplore.

By Jonathan Tobin, JNS

If American Jews are unhappy with Israel, it may not be so much a function of a new law that says it’s a Jewish state as the growing consensus that it is an “illiberal” state. That’s the new narrative being promoted by many of the Israeli government’s critics.

In numerous articles published in both secular and Jewish media, the critique has not been so much about the nation-state law as the notion that Israel no longer represents liberal Jewish values that Diaspora Jews consider integral to their identity. Sometimes this thesis is put forward from those who consider themselves Zionists, and sometimes from those who make the case that support for Israel and Zionism is itself illiberal. But the consistent theme is that contemporary Israel no longer fits with the way most American Jews think, and that the fault for this lies squarely on the shoulders of the Israelis.
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 Angry protests have spread across Iran with people chanting ‘Death to the Dictator’ against the suppressive regime led by President Hassan Rouhani

By Mark Hodge, THE SUN 

THE Iranian regime has fired on protesters amid Trump’s economic sanctions – as an expert warns the country is on the brink of revolution.

Since August 2, people have taken to the streets of Iran chanting “Death to the Dictator” in angry demonstrations against the tyrannical government and the Islamic Republic’s sluggish economy.

Last Friday, a young man was shot dead by regime forces in Karaj outside of capital Tehran while a large number of protesters were arrested, according to resistance units.
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This is the opportunity to take advantage of economic problems to effect a regime change.

By Amil Imani, INN

Over the past 40 years, many of us have seen various Iranian opposition groups and TV channels pop up, one after another, but none united or supported their competitors. Each group had its own agenda. A typical Iranian dilemma: “too many chiefs, not enough Indians.”

Let’s make a note of it: If we remain divided, there won’t be a chance against the powerful Islamic regime with the vast and destructive power apparatus who has no problem in using it against its own population as it did to the 2009 Green Movement.

Sadly, my experience tells me that Iranians are inherently too stubborn to work within a group like Japanese are.  A Japanese proverb says “A single arrow is easily broken, but not ten in a bundle.” This means that ten arrows are stronger than a single arrow. If you change the arrows to people, you will understand more about why the Japanese are so group oriented.
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By Dr Eran Lermer, ISRAEL HAYOM