The Canadian government has expressed “zero tolerance” for boycotters of Israel.

By: Tzvi Ben-Gedalyahu, JP

Israel is the only country targeted by BDS.

The pro-Israel Canadian government may be planning to include boycotts of Israel as a hate crime, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) reported Monday.

It said that such a move would target organizations such as the United Church of Canada, Canadian Quakers, campus protest groups and labor unions. It also would raise legal questions under Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
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Institute for Contemporary Affairs, JCPA
Founded jointly with the Wechsler Family Foundation, Vol. 15, No. 14     May 11, 2015  

By Lazar Berman, JCPA

• The Kurdish peshmerga forces have proven willing and able to stand up to the Islamic State (formerly ISIS) on the battlefield in northern Iraq. Several Western countries, realizing that the Kurdistan Region, the most stable and secure region of Iraq, could fall to IS unless they stepped in, increased military aid to the peshmerga after the city of Mosul fell in the summer of 2014.

• The peshmerga are primarily stocked with light arms, many of which were captured from Saddam Hussein’s forces during the wars in 1991 and 2003. AK-47s and Soviet machine guns make up the preponderance of their light weaponry. Soviet-era howitzers, small mortars, old Soviet T-54/55 tanks make up most of their heavier weapons.

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Today, Bodyguards assigned to incoming justice minister Shaked after threats made on her life

The reason Netanyahu would love to kick Bayit Yehudi out of the government is that they challenge his fundamental policies. He wants to protect the Court’s power and wants to stay in a holding pattern regarding construction in Jerusalem and J&S whereas Bennett wants aggressive action on these fronts. Kaluna, UTJ and Shas are quite happy with Netanyahu’s policies in this regard.

By George Friedman of Stratfor.com

In recent weeks, we have been focusing on Greece, Germany, Ukraine and Russia. All are still burning issues. But in every case, readers have called my attention to what they see as an underlying and even defining dimension of all these issues — if not right now, then soon. That dimension is declining population and the impact it will have on all of these countries. The argument was made that declining populations will generate crises in these and other countries, undermining their economies and national power. Sometimes we need to pause and move away from immediate crises to broader issues. Let me start with some thoughts from my book The Next 100 Years.

Reasons for the Population Decline
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V. Sharpe. This is another superlative article by the ever prescient Mark Steyn.

He points to the nauseating dhimmitude behavior expressed by so many in the media, including even Fox News, towards Pamela Geller’s exposure of the double standards displayed towards free speech, especially when it comes to criticism of Islam and the weapons it uses against the West and Judeo-Christian civilization: jihad and sharia law.

I have written about the growing poisonous and pernicious influence within western society of what can be called the unholy trinity of political correctness, multiculturalism and diversity.

This debilitating belief is rotting the very fabric of society and western culture. It is the enemy within the gates working in concert with the external enemy: Islamic triumphalism.

by Mark Steyn

As we mentioned a week ago, I’m none too well at the moment, and it so happens my preferred position in which to write causes me severe pain – which is presumably some kind of not so subtle literary criticism from the Almighty. But I’m back, more or less, with lots to catch up on. There were two big elections in recent days, with dramatic results: in Alberta, the Tories were wiped out; in Scotland, the Labour Party was slaughtered; in England, the Liberals were crushed. Strange times.
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By Prof. Eyal Zisser, ISRAEL HAYOM

In Damascus and Beirut last week, Syrian President Bashar Assad and Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah proclaimed the launch of the “Qalamoun Mountains campaign,” aimed at restoring control of the strategic range on the Syrian-Lebanese border. The two leaders admitted to a recent string of defeats, but took solace in the fact that in any war of existence, such as the one they are currently waging, there are ups and downs.

Reports from the Qalamoun region itself, however, reveal that in the meantime Hezbollah fighters and the Syrian soldiers are sustaining considerable losses on the battlefield. There have also been reports of widespread panic among the Syrian leadership and preparations to abandon the capital.
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‘Derekh Chaim’ is the first haredi yeshiva to incorporate IDF service – and hopes to raise Israel’s next generation of cyber-warriors.

By Hillel Fendel, INN

 A first-of-its-kind haredi-religious yeshiva has officially been accepted into the ranks of the IDF’s hesder movement. Named Derekh Chaim (Path of Life), it combines not only Torah studies and military service, as in all hesder yeshivot, but also technological studies, with an emphasis on cyber-warfare.

Derekh Chaim was initiated by none other than the Defense Ministry’s Security-Sociological Wing and the IDF’s Manpower and Chief Rabbinate Departments, for the purpose of enabling young haredi men the opportunity for “meaningful IDF service.”
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By Diane Bederman, TOI

What propels Christian Zionists? Why do they love Israel so much? CBS reporter Bob Simon, in a 1992 “60 Minutes” program found the answer: Because the return of the Jews to their ancient homeland is seen by Evangelicals as a precondition for the Second Coming of Christ.

Somehow I don’t see the Jews as the winners from all this love. The Jews have given their blood in more wars since 1948 than I care to remember in order to keep this Jewish homeland Jewish, yet they aren’t the principle winners in this vision.
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by Daniel Pipes, Washington Times,  May 8, 2015

A ranking Iranian political figure, Issa Kalantari, recently warned that past mistakes leave Iran with water supplies so insufficient that up to 70 percent, or 55 million out of 78 million Iranians, would be forced to abandon their native country for parts unknown.

Many facts buttress Kalantari’s apocalyptic prediction: Once lauded in poetry, Lake Urmia, the Middle East’s largest lake, has lost 95 percent of its water since 1996, going from 31 billion cubic meters to 1.5 billion. What the Seine is to Paris, the Zayanderud was to Isfahan – except the latter went bone-dry in 2010. Over two-thirds of Iran’s cities and towns are “on the verge of a water crisis” that could result in drinking water shortages; already, thousands of villages depend on water tankers. Unprecedented dust storms disrupt economic activity and damage health.
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JPOST

US President Barack Obama has told associates that he intends to veto the French proposal for a UN Security Council resolution mandating the creation of a Palestinian state and an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank within two years, Channel 10 is reporting on Friday.

By David Daoud, ALGEMEINER

IDF soldiers from various units who fought in last summer’s war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip called a recent report by NGO Breaking the Silence a “total lie.”

The soldiers spoke to Israel’s Channel 2 to tell their side of the story, and to counter the testimonies compiled by Breaking the Silence.

One soldier called the report “a wicked story” and a “stab in the back.”
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By Martin Sherman, JPOST

The United States remains committed to a two-state solution… that can bring lasting peace and stability to both peoples. A two-state solution is the only way for Israel to ensure its future as a Jewish and democratic state. And it is the best path forward for Israel’s security, for Palestinian aspirations, and for regional stability. – Samantha Powers, US ambassador to the UN, April 21

If the new Israeli government is seen as stepping back from its commitment to a two-state solution – that makes our jobs in the international arena a lot tougher because our ability to push back on efforts to internationalize the conflict…
has depended on our insistence that the best course is in achieving a two-state solution. – Wendy Sherman, US under-secretary of state, April 27
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By Caroline Glick, JPOST

The notion that a rape victim deserved to be raped because she was wearing a tight outfit lights up all our red lights.

This is the case first and foremost because it absolves the rapist of responsibility for his crime.

Then too, attempts to blame a rape victim for her victimization infuriate us because they are substantively untrue. If men are more likely to rape women in tight clothing then rape should be all but non-existent in traditional Islamic societies. Yet the opposite is the case. Rape and sexual abuse are endemic to such societies. According to the UN, a whopping 99.3 percent of Egyptian women report having suffered sexual abuse.
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T. Belman. DEBKA has a dubious reputation for accuracy. Recently I posted the article from DEBKA, Obama turns a smiling face to Israel. It turned out to be total bullshit.

Here we go again. Obama contradicts DEBKA.

US President Barack Obama has told associates that he intends to veto the French proposal for a UN Security Council resolution mandating the creation of a Palestinian state and an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank within two years, Channel 10 is reporting on Friday.

DEBKA, May 6/15

DEBKAfile reports exclusively from Washington: US President Barack Obama did not wait for Binyamin Netanyahu to finish building his new government coalition by its deadline at midnight Wednesday, May 6, before going into action to pay him back for forming a right-wing cabinet minus any moderate figure for resuming negotiations with the Palestinians.

Banking on Netanyahu’s assertion while campaigning for re-election that there would be no Palestinian state during his term in office, Obama is reported exclusively by our sources to have given the hitherto withheld green light to European governments to file a UN Security Council motion proclaiming an independent Palestinian state. Although Netanyahu left the foreign affairs portfolio in his charge and available to be filled by a suitably moderate figure as per the White House’s expectations did not satisfy the US President.
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By Jonathan Tobin, COMMENTARY

[..]
There is something to be said for that way of thinking on a lot of issues. But what has happened during the debate about the nuclear threat from Iran illustrates that much of what passes for bipartisanship is merely an effort by which the losers pretend they haven’t been taken to the cleaners while the winners agree to let them engage in such a charade.

That is exactly what has happened on the Iran deal bill.

It should be recalled that coming into 2015, it appeared that there was an overwhelming bipartisan majority in both Houses of Congress for increased sanctions on Iran that would strengthen the administration’s hand in the nuclear negotiations. But President Obama had no interest in getting tough with his negotiating partners and bitterly opposed the idea. Once it became clear that he would make enough concessions to the Iranians to entice them to agree to a framework deal, the focus of those seeking to respond to events was on passing a bill that would force the president to submit any agreement to Congress for ratification. The president was as opposed to that idea as he was to more sanctions arguing that he need not be trammeled by the Constitution’s requirement that any treaty receive a two-thirds positive vote in the Senate.
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Her flaw? She tells the truth.

By Jack Engelhard, INN

They used to say that oftentimes Golda Meir was “the only man in the room.” The same might be said of Ayelet Shaked.

A Member of Knesset since 2013, Shaked, 39, was recently appointed to serve as Minister of Justice for Benjamin Netanyahu’s government. The appointment has been greeted with satisfaction from many on the Right and with howls of protest from everybody on the Left.

The Left does not like her because too often she speaks her mind and tells the truth. To the Left, this is a flaw.

Shaked believes in no two-state solution and Arab MKs, including Ahmed Tibi and Haneen Zoabi often felt the lash of her rebuke. The lady is no pushover.

She is called “extreme”…an “extreme right-winger”…but that’s what they call anyone who is combative for the Jewish State.

Arabs in Israel, to her thinking, are welcome to their rights.
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INN reports:

The talk of legalizing the buildings and communities comes after the NGO Regavim presented MKs with aerial maps showing 2,026 homes in Judea and Samaria that are in danger of demolition due to anticipated petitions by radical leftist groups.

While Jewish Home’s coalition deal with Likud included establishing the team to legalize homes, it appears to have made no mention of the Jewish construction freeze, in an apparent abandonment of an earlier demand to lift the freeze.

The covert freeze on building has reportedly been in place since late 2013, and has continued since then in Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem, aside from a handful of building announcements in the capital, even as Jewish Home was in the last coalition government and Ariel served as housing minister.

Likud’s proposed bills wouldn’t harm judicial independence, only the court’s excess powers

By Evelyn Gordon

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said his new government aspires to enact legislation to restrain the Supreme Court. But this weekend, his spokesman said Netanyahu “consistently championed the independence of Israel’s judiciary” for three terms and will “do so vigorously during his fourth term as well.”

So one of those two statements is clearly a lie – at least according to former Supreme Court President Aharon Barak, current Supreme Court President Miriam Naor, Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein and President Reuven Rivlin, all of whom last week assailed the Likud party’s proposals as undermining the court’s independence and even democracy itself.

Yet in reality, both of Netanyahu’s statements are true. The only lie is his critics’ claim that the bills would undermine either judicial independence or democracy. Read more…