Muslim migration carries a heavy price.

By Daniel Greenfield, FPM

Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is a New York writer focusing on radical Islam.

Canada’s capital is a small sleepy city of less than a million. Its average annual murder rate is only 10. That’s a weekend in Chicago. But last year something strange happened to Ottawa’s murder rate.

It shot up to 24 homicides.

The last two murders were of Somali Muslim sisters Asma and Nasiba. Their murderer was their brother, Musab A-Noor. Despite the obvious history of Muslim honor killings of women, often carried out by brothers against their sisters, Musab was found “unfit” to stand trial. A director at the Somali Centre for Family Services insisted that Somali settlers in the city need more mental health funding.
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The heretical views of Trump’s ambassador to Israel recommend him for the job.

By Bret Stephens, WSJ

Diplomats from some 70 countries will assemble in Paris on Sunday for another Mideast conference, intended to preserve the two-state solution for Israelis and Palestinians. The timing is not accidental: With five days to go in the Obama administration, there are whispers that the conference may lead to another U.N. Security Council resolution, this time setting out parameters for an eventual Palestinian state.

The question is: For what?

Climate change aside, the cause of Palestinian statehood is the central obsession of contemporary global politics. It’s also its least examined assumption.
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President Obama has gone rogue and only one man can protect American democracy in the next few days: the President-elect.

By Anne Bayefsky, HUMAN RIGHTS vOICES

On January 15, 2017, with only five days left after 2,917 days in office, President Barack Obama is planning once again to feed Israel to the international wolves. The move is intended to tie the hands of President Donald Trump and is a direct repudiation of the will of the American electorate who rejected Obama’s calamitous foreign policy and a repeat performance by his secretary of state.

On Sunday, France is scheduled to hold an international conference to unleash an international mob on Israel. The meeting is taking place with Obama’s direct connivance. Seventy-states have been lined up to impose their preferences on the Middle East’s only democracy. Israelis are still dying in Israeli streets after seventy years of unending Arab terror – and the folks sitting in Paris munching on croissants know best how to protect Israeli national security.
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By Zalman Shoval, ISRAEL HAYOM

On Dec. 31, The New York Times’ Michael D. Shear wrote: “Only two days after the election, President [Barack] Obama sat by President-elect Donald J. Trump’s side in the Oval Office and declared that the No. 1 priority in his last days in the White House would be ensuring a smooth transition of power. What Mr. Obama did not say was that he also intended to set up as many policy and ideological roadblocks as possible before Mr. Trump takes his oath of office on Jan. 20.”

The New York Times may have endorsed Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton during the race, and it has attacked the Republican president-elect at every opportunity, but Shear proves it still abides by journalistic ethics.
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BIBI MUST REJECT THIS IN NO UNCERTAIN TERMS.

A draft summary statement of Sunday’s gathering, obtained by Haaretz, says the participating countries will not recognize unilateral changes to 1967 borders, including Jerusalem.

By Barak Ravid, HAARETZ

The dozens of countries attending the Middle East peace conference in Paris on Sunday are expected to call on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to publicly renew their commitment to the two-state solution, and to renounce officials in their respective governments who oppose it. The clause is contained in an updated draft of the conference’s summary statement, a copy of which was obtained by Haaretz.
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TIP

The 2015 nuclear deal obligated Iran to keep no more than 130 metric tonnes of heavy water, a material used in the production of weapons-grade plutonium.

But the Iranians have continued to produce heavy water, and they exceeded the cap in February and November [a][b]. The violations functionally blackmailing the Obama administration: either someone would purchase the excess heavy water, allowing Iran to literally profit from violating the deal, or the Iranians would go into formal noncompliance, endangering the deal.

After the Iranians violated the deal in February the Obama administration purchased the excess heavy water for $8.6 million [c]. After they violated the deal in November State Department spokesperson Toner refused to call the overproduction a violation — “I’m not going to use the V word necessarily in this case” — and the Iranians eventually found someone else to purchase the excess [d].
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JPOST

[MY TAKE IS THAT MANY RAN AWAY AND MANY STAYED.]

The military trainer that shot and purportedly killed the terrorist who rammed his truck into a group of people killing four in Jerusalem’s Armon Hanatziv neighborhood on Sunday claimed that IDF soldiers on the scene were hesitant to shoot due in part to the conviction of IDF soldier Elor Azaria on manslaughter charges.
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T. Belman. I generally agree with this moderate approach. But Oppenheimer missed a key complaint with Netanyahu’s conduct, namely he failed to assert our legal right to the land or even that the settlements were legal. He could have done this every time he said he was ready to meet or he was for the TSS. He would then have staked our claim to the land while are the same time offering to compromise on our rights to achieve peace. By not doing so he left Israel defenseless against the claim that the lands are occupied Palestinian land. By not doing so he left a vacuum for the UN to fill which they did in Res 2334. In that sense he is very much responsible.

Netanyahu was all defense with no offense.

By Rabbi Lenny Oppenheimer, JP

To the Editor:
I read Shmuel Sackett’s “The UN Vote: It’s not Obama’s fault,” with a great deal of distress. In this article, Sackett claimed that there is only “one person responsible for this terrible UN vote. His name is Benjamin Netanyahu”. He then lists Netanyahu’s alleged shortcomings: having publicly supporting a two state solution, being unwilling to completely annex Judea and Samaria, having imposed a freeze on any settlement activity for some time and not allowing new settlements, and arresting Jews for praying on the Temple Mount. Not only that, Netanyahu has publicly stated that “he is ready to sit any time and any place with PLO President Abbas to continue the peace process, and that he envisions “a region where two democratic states, Israel and Palestine, live side by side in peace with secure and recognized borders”. He finishes, as usual, by saying that only Moshe Feiglin and his employer, the Zehut party, can save Israel.
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Important as it is, energy does not alone constitute the only field of joint interest. What matters perhaps more is the strategic nature of collaboration between Greece, Israel and also Cyprus.

By GEORGE N. TZOGOPOULOS, JPOST

In the difficult economic times Greece is endeavoring to shape its foreign policy with relatively low budgets.

Although cuts in the defense sector have a negative impact, a careful and smart strategy in parallel with some favorable circumstances can counterbalance losses and possibly yield more positive results. It is here where the Greek-Israeli partnership deserves particular attention.
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It can’t be dead because it never lived.

By Daniel Greenfield, FPM

“Is the two-state solution dead?”

The two-state solution, a perverse euphemism for carving an Islamic terror state out of the land of Israel and the living flesh of her people, is in trouble. The solution, which has solved nothing except the shortage of graves in Israel and Muslim terrorists in the Middle East, is the object of grave concern by the professionally concerned from Foggy Bottom to Fifth Avenue.
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Prime minister reportedly promised Yedioth Ahronoth publisher Arnon Mozes he would work to close down rival newspaper Israel Hayom in return for more favorable coverage

BY RAOUL WOOTLIFF, TOI

The publisher of the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper is the businessman who conducted negotiations with Benjamin Netanyahu to receive benefits in exchange for helping the prime minister remain in power, Channel 2 news reported Sunday.

Arnon Mozes, often described as a long-time arch-nemesis of the prime minister, is reportedly being investigated under caution along with Netanyahu over the deal.
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INSS Insight No. 882, January 8, 2017

By Yoel Guzansky

In recent years, the United Arab Emirates has positioned itself as a key player in the processes shaping the region. After dealing with potential threats at home, the federation took a leading role in contending with some of the political, economic, and military challenges posed by the Arab Spring. The UAE will likely continue to use its vast economic resources and its military might to attempt to influence the direction that the Arab world is taking. In the past, the UAE exhibited moderation and restraint in its foreign relations and stood in the shadows of others. Today, however, it is the driving force behind many of the regional changes and is a key player in many arenas – not less, and sometimes more, than Saudi Arabia. Many in the Arab world and elsewhere now understand that the UAE has the power to influence the direction taken by regional developments, and they seek to attract the UAE to their side. Israel too recognizes that the UAE is an essential element in Israel’s efforts to strengthen relations with the Sunni Arab world.
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DEBKA

America’s intelligence chiefs may have been singing their swan’s song Thursday and Friday (Jan. 5-6) when they hurled allegations of election-meddling “ordered at the highest Kremlin level” against Russia at a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing in Washington. The committee’s chair John McCain picked up the ball and declared that Russian hacking was “an act of war,” after hearing grim testimony from the Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and the National Security Agency head Adm. Michael Rogers.
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By Heshmat Alavi, AMERICAN THINKER

Iran, known for its unbridled sectarian meddling in Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and Lebanon, is currently facing an unwanted quagmire and dead-end in the Levant. We cannot limit Iran’s role and its meddling across the Middle East to 2016 alone. There is an ongoing war in the region, resulting from Iran’s escalating interventions.

Iran’s ultimate objective is to completely restructure the region’s entire fabric, pursuing a truly destructive and very dangerous policy in this regard. The war in Syria is one of the pillars of this initiative, also continuing in Iraq and Lebanon.

Former Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki, known for his close relations with Tehran, was the byproduct of Iran’s policies in that country. Iraq under Maliki back in 2010 was oppressing the Sunni community, leading to a major revolt by this vital sector of Mesopotamia. Iraq continues to suffer from such atrocities.
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Democrats are fine with becoming “the party of no.”

By Matthew Vadum, FPM

Democrats and left-wing activists are planning to vigorously attack President-elect Donald Trump’s cabinet nominees before Trump even takes office at Noon on Jan. 20.

The purpose of this early resistance to the incoming Trump administration is not only to deprive Trump of political legitimacy but also to undermine his authority and make it impossible for him to govern.
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Resolutions against Israel aren’t the only measures Ambassador Haley should veto.

By Taylor Dinerman, WSJ

In 1995 Congress tried to force the United Nations to reform by refusing to pay America’s dues. The effort was worthy, but it failed. The U.N. made no real changes and quickly went back to its cynical and corrupt ways. Some in Congress have suggested a repeat in an effort to force the Security Council to revoke the anti-Israel resolution it approved last month.
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By Daniel Pipes,  Commentary

Israeli–Palestinian diplomacy sadly fits the classic description of insanity: “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” The identical assumptions—land-for-peace and the two-state solution, with the burden primarily on Israel—stay permanently in place, no matter how often they fail. Decades of what insiders call “peace processing” have left matters worse than when they started, yet the great powers persist, sending diplomat after diplomat to Jerusalem and Ramallah, ever hoping that the next round of negotiations will lead to the elusive breakthrough.

The time is ripe for a new approach, a basic re-thinking of the problem. It draws on Israel’s successful strategy through its first 45 years. The failure of Israeli–Palestinian diplomacy since 1993 suggests this alternative approach—with a stress on Israeli toughness in pursuit of victory. This would, paradoxically perhaps, be of benefit to Palestinians and bolster American support.
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By Raphael Ahren, TOI

[..]

In her discussions with professional ministry staff, Hotovely, a member of Netanyahu’s Likud party, envisioned a large permanent exhibition that would stress Israel’s connection to the West Bank, under the headline of “Coming home,” or “Returning to the Jewish homeland.”

Countering Israel’s detractors who consider the settlements an illegal land grab — and can thus be expected to mark 50 years since the beginning of “the occupation” — Hotovely wants to celebrate the settlements as the Jewish people’s legitimate return to its indigenous land.
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TOI : US agencies said to identify parties who gave hacked emails to WikiLeaks, Intel chief doubles down on assessment Russia interfered in election; Moscow reportedly celebrated Trump win in intercepted communications

By MATT FLEGENHEIMER and SCOTT SHANE, NYT

WASHINGTON — A united front of top intelligence officials and senators from both parties on Thursday forcefully reaffirmed the conclusion that the Russian government used hacking and leaks to try to influence the presidential election, directly rebuffing President-elect Donald J. Trump’s repeated questioning of Russia’s role.

They suggested that the doubts Mr. Trump has expressed on Twitter about the agencies’ competence and impartiality were undermining their morale. Read more…