Now that the war is more or less over, Tehran is not just tightening its military hold over the Assad regime, it’s doing big business in Syria

By David Rosenberg, HAARETZ

The short history of the Syrian civil war is that President Bashar Assad killed hundreds of thousands of his people, sent millions fleeing from their homes and turned entire cities into rubble with the sole purpose of keeping himself in power.

The short history of the post-war era is that he is now signing away Syria’s sovereignty to Iran, with the same goal in mind.

Israel is justifiably anxious about the military inroads Iran is making in Syria as the six-year conflict gradually draws to a close, or more likely, deteriorates into constant low-intensity strife. But Israel should be just as concerned about Iran’s apparent intention of entrenching itself economically in Syria.

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By Norman Bailey,AC DEMOCRACY

Two recent decisions by European official bodies indicate that the answer to the question posed in the title of this article may be “yes”.

The court of the European Union has ruled that no member country has the right to close its borders to illegal immigrants if doing that is contrary to EU policy. I can’t think of anything the court could have done that would be more likely to trigger more withdrawals from the Union.

Every member country knew that by joining the EU it would be giving up part of its sovereignty, but the primordial duty of any government is to protect the state and its citizens, and if a member country is denied the fulfillment of that duty it will have no choice but to refuse to accept that ruling, and if necessary, withdraw from the Union. Poland and Hungary have already declared that they will not recognize the ruling and it remains to be seen if other countries will follow suit and, if they do, what the bureaucrats in Brussels will do about it.

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By Conrad Black, NATIONAL REVIEW

As usual with President Trump’s more imaginative moves, the arrangement with the Democratic congressional leaders to defer the debt-ceiling issue for three months and pass hurricane relief at once was a more important step than it appears. The key element of it is that he has moved to higher and more defensible political ground.

Since his inauguration, the president has been slugging it out with the Democratic congressional leadership, who promised and have delivered “scorched earth” and mindless obstructionism, while the House Republican leadership pompously imagined that it held the balance of power and would determine whether to drop the president like Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell’s famous “hot rock” or play along with him.

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One by one the nationalists who backed candidate Trump’s agenda were ousted in favour of the globalists. And it shows in Trump’s actions

By Lawrence Solomon, NATIONAL POST

After a breakneck beginning to his presidency during which Trump racked up success after success, a toothless new Trump is emerging, one who looks more like Barack Obama than Candidate Trump or Early President Trump.

Early President Trump—despite the poisonous infighting between the White House’s nationalists and globalists—halved illegal immigration and doubled GDP growth, approved the Keystone and Dakota Access Pipelines, cancelled the Paris Climate Agreement, brought back mining and manufacturing jobs and, reports the Wall Street Journal, set a record by “rolling back more regulations than any President in history.”

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Largest and most detailed study of attitudes towards Jews and Israel ever conducted in Britain finds one in three citizens holds at least one anti-Semitic attitude

By Robert Philpot, TOI

LONDON — Nearly one in three Britons holds at least one anti-Semitic attitude and more than half endorse at least one hard-line anti-Israel statement, finds a major new study published today.

It also establishes an “unambiguous” link between anti-Semitism and hostility towards Israel – suggesting that the stronger the level of anti-Israel feeling, the more likely it is to be accompanied by anti-Semitic attitudes – and probes the attitudes of those who support the far-left and the far-right, as well as British Muslims.

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A briefing by David Schenker, MEFORUM
September 12, 2017

^{Summary account by Marilyn Stern, Communications Coordinator for the Middle East Forum.}

The Arab world’s fifth poorest country, Jordan has only a quarter of its adult population gainfully employed. Its accumulated debt represents nearly 100% of GDP and the Jordanian economy has been seriously afflicted by the arrival of 1.4 million Syrian refugees over the past few years. This, however, has not generated an overt backlash against the refugees by the indigenous population, partly because the 2015-16 terror attacks in the kingdom were perpetrated by homegrown extremists rather than by incoming refugees.

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August meeting with US officials grew heated when H.R. McMaster rejected Israel’s Hezbollah concerns, denied it was a terror group.

By Tzvi Lev, INN

A new bombshell report alleges that a meeting between high-level Israeli officials and their American counterparts last month deteriorated when National Security Adviser H.R McMaster brushed off Israel’s concerns about Hezbollah, at one point backing up an aide who denied that Hezbollah is a terror organization.

According to the report on Channel 10 and PJ Media, McMaster yelled at Israeli officials, and denied that the Iran-backed militia is a terrorist group.

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Yishai is moderating

CONFERENCE: The Jordan Option – The Ultimate Alternate Solution

Dear liberals: Conservatives are not your enemy. The Left is.

By Dennis Prager, FPM

What is the difference between a leftist and a liberal?

Answering this question is vital to understanding the crisis facing America and the West today. Yet few seem able to do it. I offer the following as a guide.

Here’s the first thing to know: The two have almost nothing in common.

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Start watching at 5:30

The original agreement negotiated by Prime Minister Netanyahu and former US president Barack Obama provides Israel with $38 billion through 2028.

By Michael Wilner, JPOST

WASHINGTON – The Trump administration will support Congress’s effort to provide Israel with more aid than was guaranteed in a formal defense package negotiated by former US president Barack Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last year, The Jerusalem Post has learned.

That agreement – a memorandum of understanding meant to govern US defense assistance to Israel through the coming decade – provides Israel with $38 billion through 2028. During the 2016 negotiations, Israel’s leadership signed a side letter promising to return any aid appropriated by Congress exceeding the $3.1 billion set aside for this fiscal year. But Congress ignored that provision, cutting Israel an additional $75 million in aid in its latest appropriations bill.

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U.S. President Donald Trump expected to set broad strategic objectives and leave commanders, diplomats and officials to implement policy • Proposal presented to Trump aims to step up pressure on Tehran to curb its missile program, stop support of terror.

Reuters and Israel Hayom Staff

U.S. President Donald Trump is weighing a strategy that could allow for a more aggressive U.S. response to Iran’s forces, its Shiite Muslim proxies in Iraq and Syria, and its support for militant groups, according to six current and former U.S. officials.

The proposal was prepared by U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, national security adviser H.R. McMaster and other top officials, and presented to Trump at a National Security Council meeting on Friday, the sources said.

It could be agreed and made public before the end of September, two of the sources said. All of the sources are familiar with the draft and requested anonymity because Trump has yet to act on it.

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