Michael Curtis wrote an article titled Russia and Israel: A Beautiful Friendship?. American Thinker published it.
In it he reviews the relationship over the last 100 years and attempts to point out that it is warming up. I didn’t find it satisfying as a lot was left out.
But what I did find interesting were the comments.
In February 2009, as President Barack Obama and his new administration were settling into office, the Center for Security Policy published a report I wrote entitled “RISE OF THE ‘IRAN LOBBY’ Tehran’s front groups move on—and into— the Obama Administration.”
This occasional paper from the Center was offered as a warning about the constellation of forces that was just then moving into power positions from which to influence U.S. foreign policy in ways supportive of the Tehran regime’s objectives.
Today, five years later, the disastrous fruits of that network’s efforts are evident across the Middle East in ways both predictable and unforeseen: Iran stands on the brink of deploying deliverable nuclear weapons, Turkey’s leadership sponsors HAMAS terrorism and harbors both neo-Ottoman ambitions and a visceral hatred of the Jewish State of Israel, and an Islamic State proclaiming itself a Caliphate sweeps armies and borders before it, oddly enabled by both Iran and Turkey.”
The Iran Lobby: Alive, well and changing the Face of the Middle East.
By Clare Lopez
The Palestinian Arabs, as a national collective, have failed the test of history. It is high time we drop the charade of their ability to achieve self-governance.
What is the point of raising and spending many millions of dollars to rebuild the Gaza Strip just so it can be destroyed in the next war? It’s a harsh question. Given the region’s tragic history, it is also inevitable.
– The New York Times, October 10
Less than two months after Israel’s summer offensive in the Gaza Strip ended, Hamas militants in the coastal enclave are rebuilding their attack tunnels.
– The Jerusalem Post, October 19
One woman survivor of the ship that sank off the coast of Alexandria said Egyptian smugglers had rammed it and that they saw people were drowning and offered no help. But I don’t think even such a terrible incident will stop the phenomenon because people are completely desperate and want to leave… Gaza.
– Haaretz, September 17.
The recent conference in Cairo on the reconstruction of Gaza was a depressing display of farce and hypocrisy.
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The decision of the most prestigious opera house in America to produce an opera that mainstreams Jew-hatred and anti-Jewish terrorism is a great victory for elitist anti-Semitism. In the world of elite anti-Semitism, Jews are told that truth is but a narrative. Jewish history and rights have no more merit – indeed less merit – than the lies of Jew-haters. And if Jews dare to object to the propagation of lies against them, they open themselves to the easy accusation that they seek to stifle free speech.
The goal of elitist anti-Semitism is to erode the right of Jews to have and promote Jewish rights and interests. This is done by demonizing those who defend Jewish rights and advance Jewish interests, while elevating and romanticizing the lives and largely false narratives of those who seek to destroy Israel.
The Met’s singular contribution to the cause of elitist anti-Semitism is the prestige its production of The Death of Klinghoffer confers on the cause.
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I told Ari Briggs how glad I am that they are doing it. I also told him that every time I talk about EU criticism of Israel’s actions in Area C as being contrary to Oslo, I always draw attention to the fact that the EU is violating Oslo because they are financially backing Arab attempts to encroach upon Area C. Ted Belman
Regavim, the research based legal think tank has announced its intention to release a report presenting tens of cases in which the European Union have actively changed the facts on the ground in Area C to unilaterally harm Israel in final status talks with the Palestinians.
In addition, following reports that the European Union has begun a new wave of diplomatic pressure against the Jewish State. The organization sent an official letter outlining some of their findings to the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister today, with a call to stand strong against EU pressure.
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I met Sherkoh Abbas six years ago after he invited me to join the American Kurdish Friendship League. We have kept in touch. This week we heard some good news, The Iraqi Kurds are being permitted by Turkey to send troops to Kobane to defend the city. While Turkey is at loggerheads with the PKK in Turkey, she has very good relationship with Iraq Kurdistan. The accommodation will also pave the way for a more substantial weapons flow to the Kurds. Ted Belman
An independent Kurdistan would be a reliable Western ally in a tumultuous region. It would be self-sustaining and an asset to the world.
BY RYAN MAURO, THE CLARION PROJECT
Sherkoh Abbas was born in Qamishli in theSherkoh Abbas Kurdistan region of Syria and came to the U.S. in the 1980s. He is the President of the Kurdistan National Assembly of Syria.
He is a founding member of the Syrian Democracy Council, the Kurdish National Congress, the America-Kurdistan Friendship League and the Center for Democracy in the Middle East, of which he is the director. Abbas previously served as the President of the Kurdish-American Committee for Democracy in Syria.
Abbas has briefed officials from the White House and Congress and organized a 2006 conference under the auspices of Senator Carl Levin (D-MI) and then-Senator Robert Voinovich (R-OH) that brought together all the Syrian opposition groups, including Kurds, Sunni-Arabs, Christians and Druze.
The following is Sherkoh Abbas’ interview with Clarion Project National Security Analyst Ryan Mauro: Read more…
The Kurds have a right to independence. Their lack of it until now is an unjust and tragic accident of history.
The borders of most of the Arab countries east of the Mediterranean were delineated in the period following WWI, on the ruins of the Ottoman Empire. The borders were fixed on the basis of British and French interests and the ties those two countries had formed with local groups.
Two non-Muslim groups were granted independence: The Jews were given Britain’s pledge – in the form of The Balfour Declaration – that it would help establish a National Home for them, and France granted the Christians dwelling north of Israel the country of Lebanon, as separate from Syria. The Zionist movement was active and visible in the political corridors of Britain, while the French empathized with the fears the Lebanese Christians held of becoming a minority in a country with a Muslim majority.
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By Ted Belman
I am fed up with Bibi. He continually thwarts right wing initiatives and Jerusalem building plans. Plus he continues to toy with another peace process presently being demanded by Kerry.
No doubt he will negotiate with the EU also to prevent their sanctions.
Both Yesha Council and Habayit Yehudit (Bennett’s party) pressed him to lift the freeze on planning and construction. In previous confrontations Bibi said ““You have no greater defender than me. I am fighting for you. But there are international constraints and you are familiar with them.”
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Economy Minister Naftali Bennett criticized Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday for failing to provide what he perceives as an adequate response to the simmering violence in Jerusalem – “more construction and an iron fist.”
In an interview with Army Radio on Thursday, Bennett said the government’s leniency invited Wednesday’s “vehicular terrorist attack” in which a Palestinian resident of east Jerusalem rammed his car into a light rail station packed with commuters, resulting in the death of a three-month-old infant girl and the injuring of nearly a dozen others.
Read more…
The London-based pan Arab daily Asharq al-Awsat reported on Thursday that the Palestinian Authority has agreed to delay by two months its plan to seek a Security Council resolution calling for an Israeli withdrawal to the pre-1967 lines within three years.
The paper quoted Palestinian sources in Ramallah as saying that the PA leadership will give US Secretary of State John Kerry a two-month window to present his own plan for peace. The sources said that the PA leadership was nevertheless determined to proceed with the Security Council bid.
The sources also told the newspaper that the PA leadership is prepared to return to the negotiations with Israel but not according to “old mechanisms.”
Read more…
At least as far as the economy is concerned, it seems that things have been going well for the Fatah-Hamas unity government in its first steps. According to reports by the Palestinian media, the government will pay the salaries of the 45,000 Hamas government employees who have not received their wages in the last four months. The funds to that end have been contributed by Qatar.
The Palestinian media has further reported on an arrangement reached with Israel to open the closed border crossings [to Gaza] and to expand the Kerem Shalom border crossing, through which building materials are already transported on a large scale for the rehabilitation of the ruins. And members of the unity government’s security forces (many of whom come from Ramallah) have been deployed at the border crossing.
Read more…
PM Calms Jordan: No Change in Temple Mount ‘Status-Quo’
Netanyahu repeats he has no intention of allowing Jews to pray at their holiest site; Temple Institute condemns ‘anti-Semitic’ measures.
By Gil Ronen, INN
Jordan’s King Abdullah II
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu told Jordan Tuesday that Israel has no intention of changing the status quo on the Temple Mount. This means that Jews will continue to be forbidden to pray on the Mount.
A bill submitted by MK Miri Regev (Likud), according to which Jews will be allowed to pray on the Mount, and not just tour it, caused alarm in Jordan. Jordan’s Ambassador to Israel Walid Obeidat reportedly demanded clarifications from the Foreign Ministry Tuesday on the new bill, following reports that it would be voted on next month.
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Man lightly wounded after stones thrown at his car in East Jerusalem; Palestinians riot, hurl stones at police, after deadly terror attack kills baby girl; police struggle to deal with ‘quiet intifada’.
Violence rocked Jerusalem on Wednesday both before and after a deadly terror attack at a Light Rail station left a baby girl dead, with riots and stone throwing reported in East Jerusalem. The attack and riots have highlighter the police’s struggle to deal with what some are calling a ‘quiet intifada’.
A man was lightly wounded after Palestinians pelted his car with stones near Beit Hanina in East Jerusalem. Damage was also caused to the vehicle, and police were searching the area for suspects.
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Cold logic says Netanyahu, Livni and Lapid have nothing to gain from new elections. But reality is often governed by a different set of rules.
If Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wanted elections now he would have done to Finance Minister Yair Lapid’s zero-VAT housing bill what he did on Monday to Justice Minister Tzipi Livni’s conversion bill – buried it alive. If Livni, who is also chairwoman of Hatnuah, had wanted elections she would have used the last hazing she took from Netanyahu and immediately bolted the coalition without looking back. But he and she are not interested, at this time, in putting themselves to the test of the voters. Lapid, chairman of Yesh Atid, certainly has no interest in it: He is expected to crash, or at least, to shrink in elections. Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman (Yisrael Beiteinu) might not crash, but it is highly unlikely that in the next Knesset he will be able to recreate his series of current achievements in reaping ministerial and parliamentary posts.
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A coalition crisis is waiting in the wings as the Knesset gears up for its winter session; EU sketches ‘red lines’ in West Bank
Yair Lapid (center), and Tzipi Livni (right), with Moshe Ya’alon (left) at a cabinet meeting last year.
A coalition crisis captures the front pages ahead of the opening of the Knesset’s winter session. The questions remains: will Israel’s government fall apart amid irreconcilable differences, resulting in snap elections?
“The last thing we need right now is elections, that’s the last thing the people of Israel need right now,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is quoted in Israel Hayom saying Tuesday. The paper reports that Netanyahu is scheduled to meet with the heads of the various coalition parties, namely, Finance Minister Yair Lapid, Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman, Justice Minister Tzipi Livni and Economy Minister Naftali Bennett, on Wednesday. The meeting aims “to agree upon a way to cooperate ahead of the opening of the [Knesset] winter session,” Israel Hayom says.
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[Time for Israel to bite the bullet. Let the EU do their worst.]
Israeli officials fear that proposed negotiations are prelude to further European sanctions.
The European Union is interested in opening negotiations with Israel with the aim of preventing a series of Israeli moves in the West Bank deemed “red lines” which may jeopardize the possibility of a future Palestinian state alongside Israel, an internal EU document obtained by Haaretz reveals. Officials in the Israeli Foreign Ministry are concerned the negotiations are a prelude to further European sanctions against Israel.
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Facing daily violence and harassment, and the target of international criticism, why are Jews moving to Silwan?
Recent days and weeks have seen “Silwan” hit the headlines time and time again, as dozens of Jewish families have moved in to this predominantly Arab neighborhood in eastern Jerusalem despite the violent opposition of many of their Arab neighbors to the presence of Jews there.
Arab extremists regularly target the embattled local Jewish communities; indeedjust hours after moving in a small group of new Jewish families were targeted by rioters who hurled bricks and molotov cocktails at their homes.
So why are Israeli families are willing to brave violence, intimidation and even international opprobrium to live there?
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