By David Singer, CFP

The Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) – refusing to bow to pressure by President Trump to cease payments to terrorists and their families currently exceeding US$400 million annually – is looming as a potential threat to end 96 years of unbroken Hashemite rule in Jordan.

PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas – addressing the ninth annual Islamic Beit al-Maqdes International Conference in Ramallah last week – has sent a veiled message of the PLO’s intention to challenge Jordan’s ruling Hashemite family if PLO demands for a State in the West Bank with Jerusalem as its capital are not met.
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by Adelle Nazarian, BREITBART

South Korean President Moon Jae-in reaffirmed his intention to end the war between the two Koreas and to establish permanent peace, which he said could be achieved with the denuclearization of North Korea.

A report in the South Korean newspaper Munhwa Ilbo published Tuesday indicated that Seoul was considering officially ending the Korean war, which currently stands at a technical stalemate as no peace treaty was ever signed. According to CNBC’s translation of the report, officials from both sides of the demarcation line are considering releasing a joint statement marking an official end to hostilities, an unnamed South Korean official told the newspaper.
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ISRAEL HAYOM

Hungarian PM Viktor Orban’s office says, “Only one way to counter the worryingly strengthening anti-Semitic phenomena. … Europe must return to its values stemming from Judeo-Christian traditions” • Orban staunchly opposes “invasion” of Muslim migrants.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s office said on Monday an “irresponsible” migration policy on the part of the European Union had stoked religious intolerance in Western Europe, threatening the Jewish population there.

His office issued the statement a week after Orban was re-elected in a landslide to a third successive term. Orban was elected following a fierce anti-immigrant campaign that vilified Hungarian-born, Jewish-American tycoon George Soros for promoting liberal, open-door values in Hungary and elsewhere in central and eastern Europe.
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By Caroline B Glick, BREITBART

The United States, United Kingdom, and France joined in a combined operation on April 14 that used “precision” strikes against Syria’s chemical weapons infrastructure. The following are key points about the raid.

1. Operationally, the strike showed the U.S. has the capacity to conduct airstrikes with allies, against significant targets, with minimal lead time.

It took less than a week for the U.S. and its allies to organize and position the air and naval platforms they used to carry out the missile assault. Indeed, according to the Wall Street Journal, Secretary of Defense James Mattis delayed the strikes twice, despite operational readiness.
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T. Belman. I have maintained that the US is not abandoning its allies in the ME and she is committed to pushing Iran back. The recent bombing of the chemical sites was only the beginning. Israel independantly has been targeting Iran and Hezbollah. Then in my Sykes-Picot article I suggested bringing the Saudis in and strengthening the Kurds. Stay tuned.

White House reportedly aiming to bring regional Arab troops to Syria instead of US forces, preventing ISIS comeback and Iranian foothold.

By Tal Polon, INN

The Trump administration is seeking to assemble an Arab force in Syria that would replace the US military presence there, US officials told The Wall Street Journal.

According to the officials, the administration has asked Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates to contribute billions of dollars to help restore northern Syria, and wants Arab nations to send troops to the area.

In line with the plan, the officials said that new National Security Adviser John Bolton had recently called Egypt’s acting intelligence chief Abbas Kamel, to see if Egypt would play a role in the effort.
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By David Israel, JEWISH PRESS

Right-wing Jewish activists staging the torture inflicted by the Shabak against Jewish detainees in the Duma investigation. December 27, 2015.

The families of the two defendants in the July 30, 2015 Duma arson/murder case revealed on Monday that during the summations in the preliminary part of the trial, which took place several weeks ago at the Central District Court in Lod March 15, the State District Attorney’s Office for central Israel announced to the court in an unprecedented step that it was waiving a number of confessions given by the defendants, Honenu reported.

These are the confessions that were extracted during the Shabak interrogations in which “special means,” a.k.a. torture, were used with the endorsement of then Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein, and with the approval of the Supreme Court.
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By Litel Shemesh, ISRAEL HAYOM

Last week, the IDF Judea Military Court exonerated terrorist Hamza Faiz, who had tried to murder Nirit Zamora, a resident of the Beit Hagai settlement. Why? The panel of judges decided the knife Faiz had used was too short and he had only stabbed Zamora once.

Faiz had gone from Hebron to a shopping center at the Gush Etzion junction. He stabbed Zamora in the back, near her spine, yelling, “Allahu akhbar.” The blade stuck in her body and the knife broke off at the handle, which was the only thing that prevented him from stabbing her repeatedly. Zamora, a mother of eight, was seriously wounded and is still enduring a painful recovery process.
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MEMRI

By: A. Savyon and U. Kafash*

In advance of Iran’s National Nuclear Technology Day, on April 9, this document focuses on a number of steps taken by the Iranian regime to maintain and further develop Iran’s nuclear capabilities – steps that deviate from the framework of the JCPOA nuclear deal, and that in some cases even blatantly violate it. This paper will address the following:

1. Iran’s intention to enrich uranium above the percentage permitted in JCPOA.
2. Leaving the plutonium core of the reactor at Arak unblocked and usable.
3. Iran’s refusal to allow International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspections at its military sites.
4. Iran Announces Decision “To Construct Naval Nuclear Propulsion” – While Naval Nuclear Propulsion Requires Uranium Enriched To 60%-90%

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T. Belman. As the author argues, Russia is being demonized unfairly. I agree. Now is the time for detente.

By Alexander Maistrovoy

While the West is busy hunting “Russian witches,” its sworn enemies devour it alive from within.

In 1986, the manager of the largest state company Eurodif Georges Besse arrived at his office as per usual. When he got out of his car, he was shot at point-blank range by unknown people on a motorcycle. Initially the authorities accused the left radical Action Directe, but very soon the intelligence service found the Iranian trace.

The Iranians, who owned shares of Eurodif, demanded Paris to pay them the dividends that were frozen after the Islamic revolution. The murder of Besse was a blatant menace and it worked. France not only failed to expel Iranian diplomats, but paid Tehran more than $1.6 billion in 1991.
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T. Belman. When Trump said that the US was only in Syria to defeat ISIS, I disagreed. I am happy that Haley corrected the record.

Haley acknowledged regional concerns and said, “We all know our work in Syria is not done.”

By Michael Wilner, JPOST

Deterring Iran’s entrenchment in Syria is one of US President Donald Trump’s top three priorities there, guiding his policy on where to station troops in the war-torn country and for how long, US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley said on Sunday.

Her statement comes amid reports of strains between the Trump administration and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government over the US role in providing a buffer between Iranian troops and Israel’s border. Trump in recent weeks has vowed to pull US troops out of Syria entirely, prompting alarm in Jerusalem that Israel’s fight against Iran would be waged alone.
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Sermons from the Years of Rage, 1939-1942, hidden during the war and now released in a new edition, is a rabbinic work unlike any since the destruction of the First Temple.

By James Diamond, MOSAIC

Where was God during the Holocaust? It’s a daunting question, and an appropriate one to raise as we approach Yom Hashoah, usually rendered as Holocaust Remembrance Day, which this year falls on April 12. But it’s also one thing to contemplate this question from the comfort of an office or synagogue. It’s something else entirely to have addressed it from within the Warsaw Ghetto. That, however, is exactly what Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira (1889-1943) did in sermons delivered in the ghetto between the fall of 1939 and the summer of 1942, when mass deportations to Treblinka began.

Known to posterity as the Warsaw Ghetto rebbe, Shapira transcribed these sermons, which were subsequently buried in the hope that they would be passed on to whoever managed to survive. Published until now under the title Eish Kodesh (“Holy Fire”), they are far more than a collection of Sabbath homilies. Together they bear witness to personal theological upheaval and a spiritual struggle of almost inconceivable proportions, conducted not only under circumstances of unrelenting torment, starvation, and death but with a very deeply felt apprehension of divine absence.

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Activists on the left have a way of applauding fellow leftists even if they are bigots. This leads to anti-Semitism by association

By Robert Fulford, NATIONAL POST

British Labour Party Leader Jeremy Corbyn, seen making an address on June 9, 2017, has been accused of ignoring anti-Semitism within his party.Frank Augstein/AP

“Britain’s next prime minister might well be an anti-Semite.” Theodore Dalrymple, an English psychiatrist and distinguished author, began a recent article with that striking speculation. He wasn’t kidding. He was discussing what some in U.K. politics call “the Labour Party’s Jewish problem,” embodied in the person of Jeremy Corbyn, the Labour leader and, conceivably, the next prime minister.

As Dalrymple explained, we can’t say whether Corbyn’s anti-Semitism is a sincerely held prejudice or merely a matter of electoral calculation — there are far more Muslims than Jews in Britain.
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The court’s fight with the coalition over the state’s policy for African migrants has precipitated the latest push to circumscribe the court’s powers.

By Yonah Jeremy Bob, JPOST

Supreme Court President Esther Hayut is set to declare on Sunday that Israel cannot maintain the rule of law and democracy if the court’s judicial review powers are cut off, according to a statement released by the court.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the coalition appear to be moving forward with several initiatives to circumscribe the Supreme Court’s powers.

“Most of all, for us these values give voice to the principle of the rule of law. An outline of this principle is that everyone is equal before the law. Additional foundational principles which manifest our system of law and democracy are: recognition of the constitutional status of the freedoms of man and maintaining judicial review,” say Hayut’s remarks.
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Dr. Jack Wheeler, TOTHEPOINTNEWS

Masada, Israel. The story of Masada makes for epic history.

Built as an impregnable fortress sanctuary by Herod I (74 BC-4 AD) in the Judean Desert overlooking the Dead Sea, the Romans continued to maintain it after Herod’s death, albeit lightly defended.

In 66 AD, the Jews rebelled against the insufferable tyranny of Rome, known to historians as The Great Revolt.  A group of Jewish rebels were able to sneak into Masada and seize it.  They were ignored as the Romans focused on Jerusalem, proceeding to sack and destroy the city and the Second Temple built by Herod in 70 AD.

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T. Belman. Trump didn’t appoint Pompeo and Bolton for nothing.  In my opinion this attack is just the beginning. Trump will impose his solution on Syria and its helpers. He owes it to his allies including the Kurds, Israelis and Saudis. Russia and Iran are no match for the coalition of the willing and these allies. Their economies are tanking. They are suffering from imperial over reach. Iran is vulnerable to local insurrection which I believe the CIA will foment. They will wilt when confronted by a strong horse.

Remember that France and Great Britain were the original mandatory powers. They are back. No coincidence here.

I believe that the strikes were considerably greater than reported. This is hidden so that Syria and its supporters can save face with a small response.

By Roger Simon, TO THE POINT NEWS, Published April 12, 2018

Lee Smith’s seminal The Strong Horse: Politics, Power and the Clash of Arab Civilizations  (2010) explains how the Arab world typically follows the leader with the most strength and power, i. e. the strong horse.

This proclivity for the powerful does not restrict itself to the Middle East, however.  Xi Jinping these days is a pretty strong horse.  Nor does it even restrict itself to dictators.  Winston Churchill may have been the strongest horse of the last hundred years, having led the allies from the brink of defeat to victory in World War II, sometimes through sheer force of will.

Now it’s Donald Trump’s turn.

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