By Mordechai Ben-Menachem

This short article is to ‘report’ on this conference, which I attended,  from the stand-point of an objective observer, who arrived at the conference highly skeptical, I am still to be convinced as to the idea’s practical implementation, but found the conference well-organised and the basic idea quite sound – though somewhat thin on practicality. [Like Trump we keep our plans close to our vest.]

Basically, the conference was quite good.  As one could expect from Ted, it was reasonably well-organised.  Most speakers knew well what they were talking about and expressed themselves well.
So much for the conference technical aspects!

The conference had two types of speakers, those who spoke about the concept of “Jordon is Palestine” and those who spoke about the present government of Jordon.  The majority were of the former type (and that was well thought of).
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ALJAZEERA

Iraqi security forces have launched a “major operation” in the Kurdish-held region of Kirkuk, advancing towards oil fields and a strategic military base, according to Kurdish and Iraqi officials.

The objective of the push early on Monday is to take control of the K1 airbase, west of Kirkuk, Lieutenant Colonel Salah el-Kinani, of the Iraqi army’s 9th armoured division, told Reuters news agency.

Iraqi forces rolled into parts of the countryside outside Kirkuk city and took control of “vast areas” without facing resistance from Kurdish Peshmerga fighters, Iraq’s state TV said.
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King Salman praised Trump in a phone call for his “firm strategy” against Iran.

By Ben Lynfield, JPOST

Saudi Arabia’s reaction to US President Donald Trump’s more confrontational posture toward Tehran was strikingly similar to Israel’s, highlighting the two countries’ common desire for a more determined American effort to counter Iranian influence in the region.

On Saturday, King Salman praised Trump in a phone call for his “firm strategy” against “Iranian aggression and its support for terrorism in the region,” the Saudi Press Agency reported.

“The king praised the Trump administration, which recognizes the magnitude of these challenges and threats and the need for concerted efforts on terrorism and extremism and its primary sponsor, Iran,” the Agency added.
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By Edwin Mora, BREITBART

WASHINGTON, DC — Some experts welcomed U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to decertify the Iran nuclear deal, but they said the American leader should have gone a step further and killed the agreement, which some analysts argue has strengthened Tehran’s narco-terror proxy Hezbollah and its hard-line Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

While some analysts praised Trump for decertifying the Iran deal, others stressed that the president did not go far enough.

“The Iran deal was, as the president said, a bad deal, possibly the worse in modern history. We should kill it. That’s what I recommended the president do, but I’m happy to see him decertify it,” Dr. Sebastian Gorka, a former deputy assistant to President Trump, told Breitbart News.
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Justice shouldn’t protect the FBI and Fusion GPS from House subpoenas.

The Wall Street Journal Editorial Board

The House Intelligence Committee recently issued subpoenas to Fusion GPS, the opposition research firm that paid for the dossier that contained allegations against then-candidate Donald Trump and ties to Russia. The dossier’s details have been either discredited or are unverified, but the document nonetheless framed the political narrative about Trump-Russian collusion that led to special counsel Robert Mueller.

Democrats and Fusion seem to care mostly that House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes issued the subpoenas, given that he officially recused himself from the Russia probe in April. But only the chairman is allowed to issue subpoenas, and Mr. Nunes did so at the request of Republican Mike Conaway, who is officially leading the probe.
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The new strategy includes major sanctions and a threat to end the deal regarding Iran’s controversial nuclear program.

By Joseph Trevithick, THE WAR ZONE

President Donald Trump has revealed a new, overarching American policy strategy toward Iran, which includes refusing to certify the controversial deal over the country’s nuclear program and new sanctions that formally label an entire portion of the Iranian government, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a terrorist organization. The announcement has already prompted criticism from the Trump Administration’s domestic opponents, foreign allies, and unsurprisingly the government in Tehran and its international partners, and will undoubtedly have massive ramifications in the months to come.
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By Bassem Eid, 

I am a proud Palestinian who grew up in a refugee camp and raised a large family. I want peace and prosperity for my people. I want an end to the misery and the destruction.

After 66 years of mistakes and missed opportunities, it is time for us Palestinians to create the conditions for peace and to work for a better future. It is time that we stopped pretending that we can destroy Israel or drive the Jews into the sea. It is time that we stopped listening to Muslim radicals or Arab regimes that use us to continue a pointless, destructive, and immoral war with Israel.

Our sad state of affairs
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The “two-state” model has brought Israel to a dead end: despair of ending the conflict and turning to its “management” as a cruel and eternal destiny. The alternative depends on the willingness of Israeli society to reach a decision instead of managing the conflict, a decision based on the understanding that there is no place in the Land of Israel for two contradictory national movements

By Bezalel Smotrich

For over a century of Zionism, the Jewish people had to wage a struggle over its very existence as sovereign in its renewed state in the Land of Israel.

This existential struggle takes shape and takes shape, consists of many systems, and, thank God, victories. But to this day it has not yet been decided. To this day, there are those among the inhabitants of this country who refuse to recognize the right of the State of Israel to exist as the state of the Jewish people, and continue to undermine its very existence and its Jewish identity. In recent decades, this struggle has been going on mainly in the so-called “Palestinian arena” with the Arabs of Judea and Samaria, who are striving to establish an Arab state within the 1967 borders, but have never concealed that this is only a stop on the way to the real goal: the return to Haifa, Jaffa, Israel. That is why they educate their children at home, in schools, in summer camps and summer camps, and no one denies that this is the founding ethos of “Palestinian nationalism” wherever it is.
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Editorial of The New York Sun

President Trump’s refusal to certify that Iran is complying with its nuclear deal came after he “threw a fit,” according to a source of the Washington Post. The president was, the Post reported, “incensed by the arguments of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, and others that the landmark 2015 deal, while flawed, offered stability and other benefits.” That left Mr. Trump, the Post’s source said, “furious. Really furious.”

Well, why shouldn’t Mr. Trump have been furious? The Post seems to suggest that he is somehow unstable, a line that’s being hawked by the New York Times. By our lights he was right to blow his celebrated stack. He had run for president, after all, on a bright line promise to exit the Iran deal. The deal itself was entered into by President Obama and Secretary Kerry with the full knowledge that both houses of Congress were against it.
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Trump says he hopes ‘new measures directed at the Iranian dictatorship’ will compel Tehran to ‘reevaluate its pursuit of terror’

My fellow Americans, as president of the United States, my highest obligation is to ensure the safety and security of the American people.

History has shown that the longer we ignore a threat the more dangerous that threat becomes. For this reason, upon taking office, I’ve ordered a complete strategic review of our policy toward the rogue regime in Iran.
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by Jerry Gordon

It pays to have knowledgeable social media contacts to get the truth about Iran’s war against  Kurdish  independence.

Last night I received a post from US Army  Brig. General  (ret.) Ernie Audino who has deep connections with the Peshmerga  and Kurdish  Regional Government as a result of liaison during the Second Gulf War.  We had interviewed  Audino for the  New English Review published in December 2015. See: “No War Against ISIS Without the Kurds”: an interview with US Army Brig. Gen. (ret.) Ernie Audino.  Audino had been in Erbil just prior to the September 25, 2017 Independence Referendum  had  met with an interviewed  both Peshmerga and Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) figures

He had sent out an alarm in his post last night regarding the provocative movement towards Kirkuk of  Iraqi  Shia Hashd  al- Shaabi  Popular Mobilization Force, under the control of Iranian Quds Force commander, General Qassem Soleimani with Iraqi National Army  US supplied M1-tanks.
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