By Pascal-Emanuel Gobry, FORBES

A great many of us pride ourselves on the subtlety of our minds, and on recognizing the complexities, both moral and practical, of the world, and this is a very good impulse.

But when this impulse is raised to the level of dogma, it risks obscuring more than it clarifies. There are some occasions–yes, few, but some–when the moral calculus is exceedingly simple.

I used to have a great personal interest in the policy detail of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I could lecture at length on the subtleties of Camp David, Taba, the Road Map; on the different kinds of settlements; on the security barrier, its precise shape and contours; on the various UN resolutions; on the history of Fatah and Hamas. By now, like Lord Palmerston and the Schleswig-Holstein Question, I have forgotten most of the details.
Read more…

Today the main factor unifying al-Qaida and Islamic State and their sister groups and followers in the region and worldwide is ideology.

By Caroline Glick, JPOST

[..]Rather, in all likelihood, something triggered both men to carry out attacks in a wholly independent or semi-independent manner.

The question is, what was the trigger and how was it pulled? The Israeli media are obsessed with the question of whether or not we are experiencing an third Palestinian terrorist onslaught, or intifada. Public Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch insists that we are not. Others insist that we are. Whatever we want to call it, we are seeing a new form of Palestinian terrorist warfare against Israel, which in many key aspects mimics the larger jihad carried out by al-Qaida and its affiliates and spin-offs.
Read more…

Palestinians riot after Friday prayers, funeral service for Hamas terrorist behind attack that left two dead.

News Agencies, Ynet reporters

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered officials to demolish the homes of Palestinians in east Jerusalem who carried out attacks on Israelis, an unnamed official told AFP Friday. The report came as Palestinians rioted Israel’s chief rabbi urged Israelis to stop attempting to enter the flashpoint Temple Mount as the victim of a this week’s terror attack was laid to rest.

“Last night, at a consultation with security officials a number of possible measures to restore calm in Jerusalem were discussed,” the official said on condition of anonymity. “Among those discussed was the sealing or demolition of terrorists’ homes, this was approved,” the official said, adding that implementation of the plan required formal justice ministry approval.

Tensions mounted in the capital as recent violence continued to reverberate through the Israeli and Palestinian communities.

A symbolic funeral was held in East Jerusalem on Friday for the terrorist behind an attack on Wednesday in which he rammed a crowd with his car, killing two, including a Druze Border Patrol officer. The terrorist, Ibrahim al-Akari, was shot and killed by Israeli forces at the scene.

Read more…

Saban-led Friends of the IDF fundraiser in Beverly Hills draws Stallone, Schwarzenegger, Streisand – and $9 million from Oracle founder.

Yael Walzer, VNET

LOS ANGELES – Not one eye in the massive ballroom of the Beverly Hilton Hotel stayed dry when Zur Goldin, the identical twin of a Givati officer killed during Operation Protective Edge, asked the 1,200 guests to stand for a moment of silence in honor of his brother and his fellow soldiers who fell in Gaza.

Hollywood royalty answered Goldin’s request with grace at the Thursday night gala in Beverly Hills, which included Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone, Barbara Streisand, Pamela Anderson, and other well-known entertainment industry figures.

Read more…

By Ted Belman

David Shafir, a Toronto student, wrote to me of his despair.

I’m a student at York University in your hometown of Toronto. The number of arab youth on campus is staggering and growing by day. As you well know, they are not passive folks. They are VERY active in EVERY possible charitable and political cause on campus, and of course, in every anti-Israel event too. They are voted in as leaders of many if not most organizations on campus. Nonmuslim folks are young, impressionable,impulsive, with tons of energy and passion for doing good. They don’t have time and patience to investigate all aspects of Isr-Pal issues. They jump on the bandwagon bcs they are emphatically told by anti-israel folks what’s going on.
Read more…

by Gabriel Scheinmann and Raphael Cohen, Foreign Affairs
November 5, 2014

http://www.jewishpolicycenter.org/5445/the-hollow-coalition

Three months since U.S. bombs first struck Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) targets in Iraq, the Obama administration has touted its 62-country coalition as a crowning achievement. Although this number might seem impressive, however, it is misleading. Of the 62 nominal allies for Operation Inherent Resolve (as the campaign is now called), only 16 have actually committed military forces, and only 11 have conducted offensive operations to date. Many appear willing to pay lip service to U.S. President Barack Obama’s condemnation of ISIS, only to ignore his subsequent call to arms.

Most disconcerting is the meekness of Washington’s supposedly stalwart European allies. The European countries that have deployed forces to fight ISIS are contributing less today than they did three years ago in Operation Unified Protector in Libya—and even in that conflict, the United States was indispensable to the mission. France is a case in point. It fired the opening shot in the Libyan campaign and sent to the front 29 planes and six warships, including an aircraft carrier. Today, however, it has devoted only 11 planes and one warship to fighting ISIS. Similarly, the United Kingdom sent 28 planes to Libya in 2011 but only eight to Iraq this year. And whereas a total of 13 European countries had contributed either ships or planes to the struggle against the Muammar al-Qaddafi regime, only five have done the same in the war on ISIS.
Read more…

By Fred Fleitz, Center for Security Policy

The Obama administration is in desperation mode on the nuclear talks with Iran. With the prospect of a Republican Senate taking action next year to thwart its controversial nuclear diplomacy and a fast approaching November 24 deadline for the talks, the Obama administration reportedly has doubled down on its previous one-sided concessions to Tehran by offering to allow it to operate up to 6,000 uranium centrifuges.

Further confusing this situation, the Wall Street Journal reported yesterday that the president wrote a secret letter to Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei in which he reportedly stressed that “any cooperation on the Islamic State was largely contingent on Iran reaching a comprehensive agreement with global powers on the future of Tehran’s nuclear program by a November 24 diplomatic deadline.”

Read more…

by Raymond Ibrahim, FrontPage Magazine

Although the birth of the Islamic state and the herald of the caliphate are often regarded as some of 2014’s “big shockers,” they were foretold in striking detail and with an accurate timeline by an al-Qaeda insider nearly one decade ago.

On August 12, 2005, Spiegel Online International published an article titled “The Future of Terrorism: What al-Qaeda Really Wants.” Written by Yassin Musharbash, the article was essentially a review of a book written by Fouad Hussein, a Jordanian journalist with close access to al-Qaeda and its affiliates, including the late Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who pioneered the videotaping of beheadings “to strike terror into the hearts” of infidels (Koran 3:151).

As Hussein explained in the introduction of his book Al Zarqawi: Al Qaeda’s Second Generation: “I interviewed a whole range of al-Qaeda members with different ideologies to get an idea of how the war between the terrorists and Washington would develop in the future.”
Read more…

By Daniel Greenfield, FPM

The Anti-Israel lobby J Street is touting their exit poll which, despite their candidates losing non-stop, suggests that Jews not only voted for the Democrats by a whopping percent, numbers that are out of step not only with the RJC poll, but with other non-partisan exit polls, but that they want Obama to pressure Israel, hate Netanyahu and support Iran getting the bomb through a nuclear deal.

These also coincidentally happen to be the positions of J Street. And those of the pollster.

There’s always something suspicious when an organization arranges an exit poll of a general population whose views just happen to perfectly dovetail with their agenda.

In this case, J Street also has the benefit of a pollster with the same agenda.
Read more…

In secret letter, U.S. president says cooperation in fight against ISIS hinges on reaching a nuclear deal between Iran and world powers.

By Barak Ravid, HAARETZ

U.S. President Barack Obama sent a secret letter to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, last month, in which he wrote that the two nations have shared interests in fighting the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria, but that any cooperation between Tehran and Washington on this issue would hinge upon reaching an agreement over Iran’s nuclear program by the November 24 deadline, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday.

The White House did not inform either Israel or America’s Gulf State allies, like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, about the letter, which was sent in mid-October, according to the report.

The White House refused to either confirm or deny the report. At a daily briefing for reporters, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said he cannot discuss private correspondence between the president and other world leaders.
Read more…

UC Davis ignores anti-Semitism carried out in the name of Palestinian solidarity. ADL called non-authentic.

Dr. Richard L. Cravatts, INN

Since its founding in 2001, the radical campus group Students for Justice in Palestine has had as its mission to demonize Israel and promote a campaign to accuse the Jewish state of apartheid, racism, brutal occupation, and crimes against humanity, among other accusations. Its radical behavior has created a toxic atmosphere on campuses where its programs and events have regularly morphed into what has been categorized as being antisemitic in nature.

Now, apparently in an effort to bring that same vituperative ideology to the faculty, a group on the UC Davis campus calling itself Faculty for Justice in Palestine recently decried a letter sent to the UC Davis administration by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) which warned that “In the wake of the recent crisis, anti-Israel organizations are placing increasing pressure on academic institutions to engage in . . . ‘Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions’ (BDS) activities,” and that school officials should be aware that groups were undertaking a campus campaign that “serve only to polarize students on campus, inflame existing tensions, and often isolate and intimidate Jewish students.”
Read more…

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff says Israel is not interested in creating civilian casualties in Gaza.

By Ben Ariel, INN

Foreign Ministry denounces ‘pointless’ probe over Turkish flotilla incident, says decision by Hague court not to pursue war crimes investigation ‘positive’

TOI

Foreign Ministry denounces ‘pointless’ probe over Turkish flotilla incident, says decision by Hague court not to pursue war crimes investigation ‘positive’

Israel’s Foreign Ministry scolded the International Criminal Court Thursday for considering an inquiry into a deadly raid on a Turkish ship, despite the court’s decision not to pursue the probe.

In a statement, the ministry denounced the “pointless” and “unfounded and politically motivated” inquiry into the 2010 raid on the Mavi Marmara that left nine Turkish citizens dead during a melee with Israeli troops.

The ICC prosecutor said Thursday that Israeli forces may have committed war crimes when they stormed the aid flotilla boat heading to Gaza, but that the possible crimes were not grave enough to merit a prosecution at the International Criminal Court.
Read more…

by Daniel Greenfield @ the Sultan Knish blog

In Nigeria and Iraq, Muslim armies are selling women as slaves. Iran hanged a woman for fighting off a rapist. ISIS was more direct about it and beheaded a woman who resisted one of its fighters.

But we don’t have to travel to the Middle East to see real horrors. The sex grooming scandal in the UK involved the rape of thousands of girls. The rapists were Muslim men so instead of talking about it, the UK’s feminists bought $75 shirts reading, “This is what a feminist looks like” which were actually being made by Third World women living sixteen to a room. This was what a feminist looked like and it wasn’t a pretty picture.

The same willful unseriousness saw Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a survivor of genital mutilation and an informed critic of Muslim misogyny, booted from Brandeis by self-proclaimed feminists. Meanwhile the major feminist cause at the moment is Gamergate, a controversy over video games which can be traced back to a female game developer who slept with a video game reviewer. Professional feminists have spent more time and energy denouncing video games than the sale and rape of girls in Nigeria and Iraq.
Read more…

JPOST

The suspected Palestinian terrorist who rammed into three IDF soldiers with his speeding van near an army post just outside of the West Bank village of El Arub on Wednesday turned himself in to security forces, the IDF Spokesperson said on Thursday. The man is currently being interrogated.

“The IDF will continue to act without hesitation to thwart terrorism and maintain security in Judea and Samaria,” the army said in a statement.
Read more…

By Mordechai Kedar, Russia Today

Palestine should exist in the form of emirates built on tribes, otherwise it will become another failed state like Syria, Iraq, Libya or Sudan, Dr. Mordechai Kedar, Director of the Center for Middle East and Islam studies at Bar-Ilan University, told RT.

The EU’s newly appointed High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy said she would pursue the creation of the Palestinian state.

‘I’d be happy if by the end of my term, a Palestinian state was to exist,’ Federica Mogherini said.

However, so far only eight EU countries recognize Palestine, with Sweden the latest to do so.
Read more…

By NAFTALI BENNETT, NYT

JERUSALEM — Recent events in the Middle East are a reminder of how the old models of peace between Israel and the Palestinians are no longer relevant. The time has come to rethink the two-state solution.

This past summer, Hamas and its allies fired over 4,500 rockets and mortars at Israel, demonstrating once again what happens when we evacuate territory to the so-called 1967 lines and hand it over to our adversaries. Peace is not obtained. Rather, we are met by war and bloodshed.

The rise of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, and other extreme elements in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, make the risks just as clear. Israel cannot afford to gamble with its security. There are no second chances in the volatile Middle East.

That is why, for its security, Israel cannot withdraw from more territory and cannot allow for the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank. If we were to pull out of the West Bank, the entire country would become a target for terrorists who would be able to set up rocket launchers adjacent to the Old City of Jerusalem and on the hills above the runways of Ben-Gurion International Airport and the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange.
Read more…

Time for a Fresh Start
By Michael Ordman, Very Good News Israel

In our weekly Torah readings we are currently learning afresh about the groundbreaking activities of the ancestors of the Jewish people. In parallel, recent news is full of the innovations being developed by startups, scientists and entrepreneurs in the Jewish State today.

Read more…

The Foreign Minister of ‘Turkish Cyprus’ called on Israel not to support development of gas projects with the ‘real’ Cyprus.

By Yaakov Levi, INN

The Foreign Minister of the Turkish Republic of Cyprus – located on the Turkish-occupied northern portion of the island and recognized only by Turkey – called on Israel not to support development of gas projects with the independent country of Cyprus, which encompasses the southern two thirds of the island.

Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman said Wednesday that all nations in the region, including Turkey, needed to respect Cyprus’ right to develop gas off its shore.

“We think it’s crucial to respect all international norms and obligations and to act according to acceptable rules in the international community,” Liberman said after meeting Wednesday with his Cypriot counterpart Ioannis Kasoulides.

On a visit to Israel this week, Odzil Nami, the Foreign Minister of the Turkish Republic of Cyprus, told Israel Radio that Israel “must not ignore the rights of Turkey in Cyprus.”
Read more…

I urge you all to take the time to watch this very important lecture by Dr Martin Sherman. Martin’s talk begins at 14:30. His introduction begins at 12:15.

He presents the only permanent long term solution to the Israel/Palestinian conflict that will work. No other solution comes close..

To listen to this lecture takes a serious commitment of time. But you owe it to yourself and to Israel to listen carefully.

I just changed the lecture video to the current version.