By Ira Strauss, NATIONAL REVIEW August 25, 2014 

By promoting democracy blindly, and with a bias for the Muslim Brotherhood, he empowered Hamas.It was the election and brief rule of the Muslim Brotherhood (under Mohamed Morsi) in Egypt that was the proximate cause of the Gaza war. It was the earlier election of the Muslim Brotherhood (in its Hamas incarnation) in Gaza that was the underlying cause. And it was unwise U.S. demands on Egypt and Palestine — demands that they hold elections and let Muslim religious parties run in them — that led to these twin evils.

Additional tunnels between Gaza and Egypt were constructed during Morsi’s year in power (June 2012 to July 2013). The materials for the tunnels at the other end of Gaza — the ones into Israel — were smuggled in from Egypt that same year. So were the new sophisticated weapons Hamas has been using. Now Israel is cleaning up the mess.
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If PM Netanyahu early elections, coalition and opposition parties will band together to delay elections until October, sources say.

Senior sources in the coalition threatened Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, saying that if his actions bring Israel to new elections, they will make sure to delay the elections by at least six months.

Israeli media have speculated that Netanyahu wants elections because of the rise in his popularity and have begun claiming that he is allowing the coalition crisis to continue intentionally. Netanyahu has not commented on the speculations, but has repeatedly said that elections will take place in 2019 as scheduled..

According to unnamed sources, if Netanyahu causes new elections to be held, several of the coalition’s parties will join together and work with the opposition to ensure the elections are delayed until October.
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2. http://mordechaikedar.com/a-taste-of-my-debate-on-al-jazeera-about-jerusalem/ – Dr. Mordechai Kedar

In this al Jazeera interview, Dr. Kedar presents himself to be the Israeli version of Dr. Wafa Sultan. – Both are brilliant, articulate, and courageous powerhouses.

3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFLc5IX8x6k – Dr. Wafa Sultan

A powerful and amazing MEMRI TV production of an interview with Arab Psychiatrist, Dr. Wafa Sultan on Al-Jazeera TV

Intellectual and Moral Wastelands that Destroy America’s Youth

by C. Bradley Thompson | 4 Jun 1999

By MARTIN SHERMAN 

Palestinian statehood & a secure Israel are mutually exclusive goals. This was always the accepted wisdom in Israel – until the discourse was hijacked by the tyrannical diktats of politically correct dogma 

We must all work toward that future: two states for two peoples. One Jewish with secure and defensible borders, and one Palestinian with its own flag and its own future, Howard Kohr, March 4, 2018.

Last Sunday, in front of 18,000 animated pro-Israel activists, AIPAC’s CEO, Howard Kohr delivered a polished and carefully-crafted _­address—totally torpedoed about midway through his 25 minute speech by a few seconds of politically-correct claptrap.
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Tax woes and a system overloaded by refugees is creating a dangerously explosive stockpile that could erupt

By Zvi Bar’el, HAARETZ

Protesters are seen in front of parliament in Amman, Jordan February 1, 2018. The sign reads ‘Go away government and deputies.’\ MUHAMMAD HAMED/ REUTERS

“I love you, oh Mulki, with the sweat of my brow I bought a tank of gas and I don’t have a penny left. Please Mulki, raise my taxes!” Thus sang the Jordanian satirical group Tashweesh Wadeh (“Clear Confusion”) about Jordanian Prime Minister Hani al-Mulki during its weekly program on the Roya network. It’s a hugely popular program that thousands of eager Jordanians eagerly await every Monday and another 1.2 million watch on YouTube.

“There’s no work and there’s no oil, we are eating spoiled chicken and using stolen electricity,” sings the group of 18 young men from the city of Irbid. Unlike Egyptian satirists who are afraid to appear on television or even on social networks, Jordan still allows such performances on the assumption that it’s better for protests to remain on the internet then get taken to the streets.

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T. Belman. This is a great article because it shows us how hateful progressives, Jewish or otherwise, can be.  While we in Israel are proudly progressive e.g. universal medical care and welcoming to the LGBT community to name a couple, we are also Zionist and nationalist and proud of it.  We have no interest in changing our policies to be more acceptable to her people, Jewish or otherwise. While she insists on being true to herself as a progressive, we in Israel insist on being true to ourselves as Zionists and Jews.

With friends like her, who needs enemies. Good riddance to bad rubbish.

My generation has only known Israel as an occupier. We won’t back anyone who supports that injustice – including the powerful lobby that is AIPAC

By Emily Mayer, HAARETZ

The festival that is the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) annual conference began on Sunday in a slightly desperate fashion.

Despite AIPAC’s recent wins around moving the Jerusalem embassy and waves of anti-BDS legislation on the federal, state, and local level, AIPAC President Mort Fridman opened the conference not with a victory cry but with a besieged appeal to the Left: “To my friends in the progressive community, I want you to know we are partners in this project…There are very real forces trying to pull you out of this hall and out of this movement and we cannot let that happen – we will not let that happen!”

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T. Belman. Let’s face it, the two communities don’t want to live together or to integrate. The left ignores this and tries to force them upon each other. Except in the case of the Arabs in J&S. For them they want a two-state solution so they won’t have to integrate.  The Right want a one state solution with compensated emigration for the Arabs.

Fewer Jews say they are ready to have Arab neighbors and fewer Arabs are accepting of Israel as a state with Jewish majority.

BY Ben Lynfield, JPOST

Palestinian protesters wave Palestinian flags as Israelis carrying Israeli flags walk past in front of the Damascus Gate outside Jerusalem’s Old City. (photo credit: REUTERS)

Relations between Arab and Jewish Israelis are getting markedly worse, with each group becoming less tolerant of the other, according to new findings.

Researchers interviewed 700 Arabs and 700 Jews from May to August 2017, as part of annual polling by University of Haifa sociologist Prof. Sammy Smooha.

More than half of Arab citizens do not accept Israel’s being a state with a Jewish majority and do not recognize Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, a significant rise from the results in 2015, the survey found.
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T. Belman. Thank God for Shaked. She is bucking head winds but making progress. I fully accept enforcing the Jewish nature of the state even at the expense of democracy. Since affirmative action in the US is not found to be unacceptable though it violates equality, similarly favouring the Jews in Israel must be acceptable though it violates equality.

Furthermore, who is to say what is encompassed by “dignity” in the Basic Law? The courts or the Knesset? How is it a denial of “dignity” to Arab citizens of Israel when Israel remains true to its purpose which is to be a Jewish state with open doors to the exiles. By living here they must accept that premise.

Ayelet Shaked wants freedom to violate human rights as the parliamentary majority understands it at any time, and freedom to discriminate between the rights of Jewish and non-Jewish citizens

By Amos Schocken, HAARETZ

Israeli Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked at the 2018 AIPAC conference in Washington, D.C., March 5, 2018.????”?

T. Belman. I certainly hope so. Now that Trump has Rocket Man on the ropes due to Trump’s bellicosity and unpredictablity, what better choice would there be than upping the ante with Bolton rather than softening the message with a peace maker.

War certainly isn’t the answer to all problems but neither is negotiating a deal, any deal as Obama was wont to do.

WAR was the only answer to Hitler’s agression. It should have been resorted to earlier. Similarly WAR is the best answer to Iranian aggression. The sooner the better. Who better than Bolton to lead the charge.

By Damon Linker, THE WEEK

Reports that John Bolton met with President Trump in the White House on Tuesday to discuss the possibility of him succeeding H.R. McMaster as national security adviser should send a chill down the spines of every American — and indeed of every person on the planet.
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By Jonathan S. Tobin, JEWISH PRESS

Pro-Israel activists gathered this week in Washington for the annual AIPAC policy conference. As usual, there was much speculation about the future of U.S. policy and complaints about the pro-Israel lobby.

If the Trump administration proposes a new Middle East peace plan that resembles those put forward by previous administrations – in terms of concessions demanded of Israel and fantasies about the Palestinians wanting peace – that might change the temperature of the relationship between AIPAC and the White House from warm to cool.

But until anything like that happens, the love fest between most AIPAC activists and the administration will continue. And that is exactly what’s behind most of the complaints about AIPAC.
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By David Israel, JEWISH PRESS

Real estate consultant, attorney Ohad Shpak, in early March issued his report on Israel’s real estate market in 2017, citing the Finance Ministry’s data which suggest 2017 was one of the weakest years in the last decade in terms of the number of market-price (meaning unsubsidized) transactions.

Summing up the past year, the share of investors in real estate purchases declined, adding up to only 17,400 apartments, a sharp drop of 22% compared to 2016, which marked its own sharp decline of 29% compared with 2015.

It should be noted that 2017 also marked the lowest rate of investors’ purchases since 2003, a year that was shadowed by an economic recession.
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Crafting a US Response to Turkish Intransigence

by Gregg Roman The Hill
March 7, 2018

http://www.meforum.org/7239/crafting-a-us-response-to-turkish-intransigence

Originally published under the title, “Navigating the U.S. Collision Course with Turkey.”

In a rare public policy speech in mid-December, National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster singled out Turkey as one of the two leading state sponsors (alongside Qatar) of “radical Islamist ideology.” The Turkish government protested the statement as “astonishing, baseless and unacceptable,” which means it was a pretty good start. McMaster’s speech highlighted an emerging recognition among Trump administration officials that Recep Tayyip Erdo?an’s Turkey poses a pernicious threat to US interests in the Near East. Since McMaster’s speech, Erdo?an has invaded Afrin, Syria (a city then controlled by America’s Kurdish allies), massacring women, children and the elderly; promoted the use of child soldiers in his fight against the Kurds; and undermined U.S. sanctions against Iran. A Manhattan Federal District Court’s guilty verdict against a Turkish banker accused of helping Iran evade sanctions speaks volumes about the growing threat posed by Erdo?an’s Turkey. Although Erdo?an was not charged in the case, “testimony suggested he had approved the [defendant’s] sanctions-busting scheme” to launder billions of dollars for Iran beginning in 2012, according to the New York Times. Read more…

For International Women’s Day, it is time for us to start thinking outside the box and to understand that a technology-based career – particularly in computers – represents a natural fit for women.

BY Stuart Hershkowitz, JPOST 

Social revolutions are dramatic and transformative, yet sometimes, they can also be surprisingly straightforward and intuitive. As the world marks International Women’s Day on March 8, a highly promising revolution is underway in Israel, and it makes pure common sense: religious women are increasingly studying computer science.

According to the 2017 Harvey Nash Women in Technology report, just 26% of women become interested in technology in high school or earlier, compared to 44% of men. Additionally, men (59%) are significantly more likely than women (44%) to enter the information technology field through a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) academic track in college. Sixty-nine percent of the survey’s respondents, including both men and women, said the key to getting more women to pursue careers in technology is encouraging women to study technology in high school or college.
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T. Belman. Everybody who pays attention, knows it. Many who advocate peace or interfaith dialogue with Muslims know it but prefer to ignore it or live in hope and fantasy. Many on the left who support the alliance between the left and Muslims, count on it.

By Prof. Paul Eidelberg

The sanity of silence induces Netanyahu to say nothing of the barbarism that would follow the creation of a Palestinian state in the Land of Israel, a state led by Muslims. It would be madness for him to declare that, since the founding of Islam almost 2,000 years ago, the disciples of this religion have slaughtered 250 million non-Muslims!  Consider some other facts.

Netanyahu knows Islam is generally regarded as one of the three great monotheistic religions. However, he is not about to quote the Catholic theologian Dr. George Weigel, who said that “To speak of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam as the “three Abrahamic faiths” is a myth.

Netanyahu knows what the renowned nineteenth-century thinker Alexis de Tocqueville has said about Muhammad, the founder of Islam. But the sanity of silence forbids him to quote de Tocqueville, who said that “there have been few religions in the world as deadly to men as that of Muhammad.”

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Prime Minister Netanyahu reportedly said after his meeting with Trump that he’s trying to solve the coalition crisis so the government can finish its term

By Noa Landau, HAARETZ

WASHINGTON – Following Prime Minister Netanyahu’s meeting in Washington on Monday with U.S. President Donald Trump, the premier reportedly said that he is trying to resolve the tension in his government so it can complete its term.

When Netanyahu left for Washington over the weekend, his coalition was deadlocked over demands by his ultra-Orthodox coalition partner, United Torah Judaism, to pass a law before the 2019 state budget goes through, which would exempt Haredi yeshiva students from the draft.

His trip to Washington also came at a time of a widening police investigation of suspected criminal wrongdoing, now focusing on Netanyahu’s ties to the controlling shareholder of the Israeli telecom giant Bezeq and its news website.

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Jews in the diaspora are increasingly at odds with mainstream Israel in a replay of the timeless Jewish challenge of finding the right balance between particularism and universalism.

By Daniel Kryger, JNS

(March 7, 2018 / Mida) Jews in the diaspora are increasingly at odds with mainstream Israel concerning crucial issues affecting the future of the Jewish people. These include the path to Arab-Israeli peace, African infiltrators in Israel, the rapid growth of Muslim communities in the West and the Iran nuclear deal.

Recently, Jewish leaders in the United States met with leaders of Qatar, despite opposition from Israel. Qatar is financially supporting the anti-Semitic terrorist group Hamas and is the home of the bigoted, anti-Israel Al Jazeera media network.
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Saudi and Israeli officials met in Egypt to discuss normalizing ties, according to a report in the Arab media.

By: Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

The Saudi crown prince. (YouTube Screenshot)

In his first public trip abroad since becoming Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed Bin Salman, flew to Cairo on Sunday to sign multi-billion dollar agreements with the Egyptian president. According to a Wednesday report in the London-based Arab newspaper Al-Araby Al-Jadeed, he also met there with senior Israeli officials.

The broad theme of the meeting was the normalization of ties between the two countries, said the paper, which have yet to recognize each other or have open diplomatic relations. Saudi Arabia’s support for the peace plan that U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration is putting together was also discussed, notwithstanding the fact that the plan’s details have not officially been revealed.
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