by Jonathan Schanzer
New York Times 

The failed coup in Turkey will set back global efforts to combat the Islamic State.

For one, trust between Ankara and Washington is at an all-time low. A Turkish ministercharged on TV that the United States was behind the attempted coup. The State Department fired back, stating that, “claims about any role by the United States in the failed coup attempt are utterly false and harmful to our bilateral relations.”
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Ted Belman. In the face of 120,000 rockets deployed by Hezbollah in Lebanon and financed by Iran, contrary to Res 1701, Amb Samantha Power, in her speech to the SC, chose to refer to the  “steady stream of violence on both sides of the conflict” in Israel and castigate Israel for “systematic process of land seizures, settlement expansions, and legalizations of outposts that is fundamentally undermining the prospects for a two-state solution.”

Let there be no illusions about US support for Israel or reliability to enforce any resolutions they negotiated for our protection such as Res 1701.

By Joseph Klien, FPM

Every calendar quarter the United Nations Security Council holds an extensive debate on the Israeli-Palestinian “situation.” The Israeli and Palestinian UN representatives make speeches following the Secretary General’s report on the current status, which are normally predictable restatements of their respective positions. This time, however, Israel’s ambassador Danny Danon, addressing the Security Council at its July 12th meeting, presented new graphic evidence of Hezbollah’s alarming arsenal of rockets and missiles located in civilian areas of southern Lebanon.
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by Ryan Cristin

“As a journalist, to say these words, I can’t tell you with what a heavy heart I say them, but we’ve entered an era in which it is not crazy to assess news events to see if they’re real or not real, in the United States, as well as overseas, and if fact, it’s kind of crazy not to.”

– Former Clinton consultant Naomi Wolf The resounding applause that followed that extremely impactful statement serves to demonstrate quite clearly how many Americans are becoming acutely aware of their own government’s manipulation of their lives.
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The two-state solution has a slew of obstinate Jewish advocates.

By Rabbi Steven Pruzansky, INN

There was a time not long ago when the notion of a two-state “solution” to the conflict in Israel was considered anathema and dangerous, the very definition of an anti-Israel stance. Menachem Begin perceived the rise of a Palestinian state as a dire threat to Israel’s very existence. Even the dreadful Oslo Accords made no reference to it, and Yitzchak Rabin declared, perhaps disingenuously, that the Oslo Accords would thwart the creation of a Palestinian state.

My, how times have changed. Successive Israeli governments of both left-wing and right-wing varieties have endorsed, at least in theory, a two-state solution, prompting the American government under George W. Bush to support the same under the right circumstances. That little progress has been made towards achieving that goal is due to the obstinate and violent tendencies of the Palestinian Authority, its tacit and occasionally explicit support of terror, the failures of Oslo, and the perpetuation of the Arab dream of destroying Israel.
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By Ben Caspit, Al Monitor

The first order that Avigdor Liberman gave when he entered the Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv May 31, was to complete an operative plan to defeat Hamas in the Gaza Strip. According to one senior security source, Liberman expressed disbelief that no such Israel Defense Forces (IDF) plan was elaborated.

AL MONITOR

After meetings in Moscow with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, US Secretary of State John Kerryannounced July 15 that the United States and Russia had made progress toward “concrete steps” to restore the fraying cessation of hostilities, collaborate in targeting Jabhat al-Nusra — al-Qaeda’s Syria affiliate — and boost talks on a political transition in Syria.

Kerry refused to lay out the details because they “need more work in order to work.” The United States has proposed a plan to set up a Joint Implementation Group with Russia to coordinate airstrikes in Syria in return for Moscow restraining the Syrian government’s air force against Syrian armed groups.
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BRIETBART

Billionaire real estate developer Donald Trump will complete his nationalist populist takeover of the Republican Party—a hostile one—here this week at the Republican National Convention.

The convention, which kicks off this morning, is sure to be filled with Trump’s style. Trump, his wife Melania, and children Donald, Jr., Eric, Ivanka and Tiffany, will each speak throughout the week. The themes of the party’s convention this year—normally a coronation for a run-of-the-mill ordinary Republican—will be anything but ordinary. Over each day will loom a Trumpian-phrased theme, like Monday’s “Make America Safe Again” or Tuesday’s “Make America Work Again.” Wednesday will be “Make America First Again” day, and on Thursday Republicans will celebrate the goal to “Make America One Again.”
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by ANDREW C. MCCARTHY, NATIONAL REVIEW 

By failing to take the jihadists’ ideology seriously, we refuse to understand the breadth of the threat we face. Well into year eight of Obama, with the prospect of years nine through twelve hanging heavy in the candidacy of Hillary Clinton, it feels like I write the same column every few weeks now. How could it not? Fort Hood, Detroit, Times Square, Portland, Cairo, Benghazi, Boston, Garland, Paris, Chattanooga, Paris again, San Bernardino, Philadelphia, Brussels, Istanbul, Orlando, Istanbul again, Dhaka, and now, Nice.

Even if we leave out the more overt war zones in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Libya, Somalia, Egypt, and Israel, the jihadist attacks targeting the West are coming in more rapid succession: iconic targets, dates of commemoration, diplomatic outposts, tourists, and citizens just going about their lives.
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By Bruce Bawer, CITY JOURNAL

After Nice, let’s stop the nonsense.

No more attempts to psychologically analyze every new jihadist—to probe his troubled family or professional life in an attempt to figure out what “turned him to violence and extremism.”

No more reflexive reassurances that “this has nothing to do with Islam,” that a handful of bad guys have “hijacked” a “peaceful” faith, and that “the great majority of the world’s 1.5 billion Muslims are, of course, peace-loving people who utterly reject this kind of action.”

No more slick pivoting to the subject of gun control, or American homophobia, or whatever other diversion seems useful under the specific circumstances.
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By Eric R Mandel, FORWARD

Last summer, a fierce debate in the pro-Israel community over how to best curtail the Iranian nuclear program took place. On July 14, 2015, after 20 months of arduous talks, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) between Iran, the P5+1 countries, and the EU was announced. On the deal’s anniversary, we asked two pro-Israel leaders, one on the right and one on the left, to share their thoughts on how the deal is working one year later. To read the other perspective, click here.

President Obama “has bet global security and his own legacy that one of the world’s leading state sponsors of terrorism will adhere to an agreement to curtail its nuclear program.”

Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic

“In the United States, support is growing for the notion that (President Obama) has failed to hold Tehran accountable for nuclear violations, downplayed Iran’s economic windfall from sanctions relief, and ignored the deal’s negative regional implications for state sponsorship of terrorism.”

Raymond Tanter, Foreign Policy Magazine
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Likud MK Yoav Kisch to present coalition faction leaders with the bill designed to make political activity by foreign-funded groups subject to existing campaign finance restrictions • Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wants to fast-track legislation.

By Shlomo Cesana, ISRAEL HAYOM

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is promoting a bill that would prohibit activity by the V15 organization in the next Knesset election. The bill is the brainchild of MK Yoav Kisch and is designed to address foreign-funded groups that attempt to influence the outcome of Israeli elections by treating them as organizations that are subject to the restrictions of the Campaign Finance Law. A loophole in the current law gives groups like V15 a free hand.

The legislation says that “according to the existing law, promotional activity in an election that is not tied to a [specific] party but contribute to one party or political bloc is not subject to the restrictions that apply to parties, even if its purpose is very similar or identical — to influence the election results. So there’s a ‘back door’ around the instructions laid out in law.”
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By J.E. Dyer, LIBERTY UNYIELDING

Has anyone ever been as preternaturally well prepared for a coup as Recep Tayyip Erdogan seems to have been in the last 24 hours?

The key to understanding what just happened is the handful of things Erdogan did, immediately, that he didn’t have to do, as a response to a coup attempt by the military.

Until a few hours ago, we might have thought theprompt detention of more than 2,700 judges and prosecutors in the Turkish judicial system was chief among those.  That’s a lot of judges and prosecutors to run out and arrest right away – within hours – after a coup planned by a rogue element in the military.  It sure looks like someone was just waiting to execute an order on that one.
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By Tova Lazaroff, JPOST

scrambling to save the West Bank outpost of Amona — which is slated for demolition by the end of December — even if it means standing in opposition to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

On Sunday they hope to present a bill to the Ministerial Legislative Committee which would retroactively legalize settler homes built on private Palestinian land, such as in Amona’s case, in exchange for granting compensation to the original land owners.

The Palestinian land owners would be given the option of an alternative plot of land close to their homes or financial compensation.
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Behind the News in Israel

Both houses of Congress are at work to modify funding bills for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), as part of an effort to investigate the very legitimacy of the decades-old agency, Michael Wilner reported in the Jerusalem Post Friday. Both the House and the Senate want the State Department to, once and for all, define the term “Palestinian refugee,” and while they’re at it, reveal how many are receiving aid from UNRWA.

UNRWA was established in 1948 to assist the 750,000 Palestinians who had left Israel. Since then UNRWA has been a promoter of the Palestinian cause, funding as many as 5 million “refugees,” the majority of whom never left the homes where they were born in the Gaza Strip, the “West Bank,” eastern Jerusalem, or other Arab countries, to the tune of $1.23 billion annually, $250 million of which is donated by US taxpayers.
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Industry Braces for Losses, Layoffs as Result of ‘Buy America’ Spending Provisions

Barbara Opall-Rome, Defense News

TEL AVIV — Israeli industry is bracing for lost funding and layoffs as a result of a proposed $38 billion, 10-year US military aid package that rescinds Israel’s ability to convert a significant portion of US grant dollars into shekels for local research, development and procurement.

While Israel still hopes to prevail upon the White House to bump its top line closer to $40 billion over 10 years, government and industry sources hold little hope of US President Barack Obama’s administration wavering on Buy America demands. The proposed deal aims to follow the current $30 billion memorandum of understanding inked by both countries in 2007, which expires October 2017.
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BY David P. Goldman, ASIA TIMES

Yet another criminal known to security services has perpetrated a mass killing, the Tunisian Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel. Why did the French police allow a foreign national with a criminal record of violence to reside in France? Apart from utter incompetence, the explanation is that he was a snitch for the French authorities. Blackmailing Muslim criminals to inform on prospective terrorists is the principal activity of European counter-terrorism agencies, as I noted in 2015. Every Muslim in Europe knows this.

The terrorists, though, have succeeded in turning the police agents sent to spy on them and forcing them to commit suicide attacks to expiate their sins. This has become depressingly familiar; as Ryan Gallagher reported recently, perpetrators already known to the authorities committed ten of the highest-profile attacks between 2013 and 2015.
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