By Diana West, JWR

As thousands of conservatives from across the country gather outside Washington, D.C., this week for the annual CPAC conference, they get to see and cheer on their favorite conservative all-stars and presidential hopefuls in person — Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, Dr. Ben Carson, Sarah Palin, Ann Coulter and many more. But something else is going on. Amid the hoopla, book signings, meet and greets, speeches, panels and bands, a tense, no-holds-barred fight is underway to try to rid CPAC of a pair of influential men with track records of working with America’s enemies — Islamic organizations the U.S. government has linked to the Muslim Brotherhood and larger world of jihad.
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By Wayne Allyn Root, FOX NEWS

Have you seen Obama’s poll numbers? They are among the lowest in history. As of today, Obama’s approval rating is at 38%. That’s just barely above Richard Nixon.

Keep in mind Obama has the support of about 35% to 40% of the American population that will NEVER abandon him, no matter what he does, no matter how bad the jobs numbers look, no matter how low the economy goes, no matter how much scandal and corruption is exposed, no matter how strong the facts are against him.

Nothing will ever change their minds. These are the “low information voters” of the Democratic Party.
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By Daniel Greefield, FPM

The international community looked into Putin’s eyes and blinked. Multilateralism has failed as badly as it did in the days of the League of Nations, but then again it never actually worked.

The international order that everyone pretends is a real force in world affairs is really the United States and a few partners doing all the work and letting the diplomats and bureaucrats of the world pretend that they matter. Without America, the United Nations would be just as useless as the League of Nations. With America, the United Nations is only a deterrent when the United States puts its foot down and the rest of the world doesn’t get in the way.
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This speech has been hailed by many as one of her best. Its sole purpose was to rally the troops. Nobody can inspire like Palin does. She delivered in spades.

By Bruce Walker, AMERICAN THINKER

The gradual re-conquest of the old Soviet empire by a former officer of the Soviet Gestapo ought to worry us a lot.  If Putin succeeds in making Ukraine a virtual vassal of Moscow, then all the other appendages of that empire – the Baltic States, the Warsaw Pact members, Belorussia,  Transcaucasia, and the sprawling Muslim nations that were once part of the Soviet Union – will have begun, willing or not, to gravitate back to Great Russia.

The question is not ideology, as it seemed to be in the Cold War.  Hillary actually came close to the truth in her speech on March 5.  This is nationalism, augmented by the desire of a strongman, in control of an economically fraught nation, to make his people feel that foreign nations are the problem.

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The way I see it, if the citizens of Crimea want to be part of Russia rather than Ukraine, the world has nothing to say in the matter. To be fair though, just as in Canada when Quebec was hollering for cessation, everyone recognized that should it vote to go, financial matters had to be settled. e.g. The seceding population must take with them a proportionate share of the national debt. Issues such as that need to be agreed upon. But America doesn’t see it that way. They see if from a cold war mentality. Russia shouldn’t be allowed to expand. Its their knee jerk reaction. Obama is not comfortable with that and prefers to allow events to take their course. But America worries that first Crimea and then Ukraine and who knows what else. Does America have a horse in this race. If Germany doesn’t care, should America? Ted Belman

By AMOTZ ASA-EL, JPOST

Russia’s problematic conduct does not excuse confusing Putin’s nationalism with imperialism, and Ukraine’s nationalism with democracy.

The tenants of the Kremlin and the White House are perfect opposites.

Vladimir Putin is an introverted, mediashy spy of few words, Barack Obama is an outgoing public speaker whose sound bites dominate headlines every week; Obama’s political conscience was shaped by the Berlin Wall’s dismantlers, Putin’s by its builders; Obama cultivates the image of a dedicated family man, the Putins last jointly faced the cameras to announce their divorce; Putin ridicules gay rights, Obama is their crusader; Putin is judo, Obama is basketball; Putin arrives in the arena stern-faced and belligerent, Obama arrives smiling and verbose, only to repeatedly emerge apologetic and floored.

It therefore comes naturally these days for Europeans and Americans to interpret the crisis that flared last month in Kiev and this week escalated in Crimea as a clash between good and evil – the latter, of course, being Putin and his imperial appetite, and the former being Obama and his imperial fatigue.
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By MICHAEL WILNER, SHARON UDASIN, JPOST

The US House of Representatives passed a bill on Wednesday that declares Israel a “major strategic partner” of the United States, reinforcing the broad relationship between the two nations and laying the groundwork for more expansive strategic cooperation.

The bill would expand the delivery of forward-deployed US weapons to Israel, as well as other military technologies, and would commit Congress to further funding of the Iron Dome short-range missile defense system.

Controversially, the bill would also invite Israel into a visa waiver agreement with the US, which has been opposed by members of the intelligence community and the Democratic caucus for multiple years.

The bill passed 410-1 in the House. The Senate has taken up a similar measure, which is still in the committee process.
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Before Crimea Was an Ethnic Russian Stronghold, It Was a Potential Jewish Homeland Jews have lived in the area since ancient times, and leaders from Catherine the Great to Stalin encouraged their settlement there

By Jeffrey Veidlinger, Tablet
March 4, 2014

“On the way to Sevastopol, not too far from Simferopol,” begins what is probably the most famous Yiddish song from the Soviet Union, “Hey Dzhankoye.” The song, named after a collective farm near the Crimean town of Dzhankoy, celebrates the alleged victories of the Soviet collectivization drive of the 1920s and 1930s, which, according to the song, magically transformed Jewish merchants into farmers. “Who says that Jews can only trade?” asks the final verse of the song, “Just take a look at Dzhan.”
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BY: Adam Kredo, Washington Free Beacon

Iran is scheduled to receive another $550 million in unfrozen assets from the Obama administration on Friday, just days after Tehran unveiled a slew of new weapons and advanced ballistic missiles.

Iranian banking authorities on Wednesday confirmed that another $550 million is now on its way to Tehran under the interim nuclear accord inked last year with the United States and other Western nations.

The United States has agreed to unfreeze a total of $4.2 billion in Iranian oil assets over the next several months. Experts have warned that because the money is being given to Iran with no strings attached it could go to fund terror-related activities or even Iran’s nuclear program.
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By STEVEN GOLDBERG, JPOST

A week ago, Belz, a Hareidi sect, threatened to leave Israel and I wrote So Go Already in a cavalier fashion.

I received this email shortly thereafter which puts another face on the issue. It appears I spoke to soon without sufficient thought. Ted Belman

Ted,  let me tell you about  Belz and the other hassidic and Yeshiva   population.

There are over 60,000 American and European Yeshiva students in Israel. Each is spending  an average of 30,-50,000 U S dollars per year in Israel.  Besides,airfare mostly El Al for their large families travelling back and forth for simchas etc Read more…

By Elhanan Miller, TOI

Two days after a Cairo court banned Hamas’s activities in Egypt, the country’s security establishment intends to revoke the citizenship of thousands of Palestinians obtained during the one-year term of deposed Muslim Brotherhood president Mohammed Morsi, an Egyptian daily reported on Thursday.

Security sources told Al-Youm A-Sabi’ that their agencies are seeking information on 13,757 Palestinians who received Egyptian citizenship from the Muslim Brotherhood government before its July 2013 ouster in a military-backed revolution. The sources said that most of the Palestinians in question are affiliated with Hamas.
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Claim that 300,000 Palestinians live in areas under full Israeli control is not quite true, says ex-official who drew the map
BY ELHANAN MILLER, TOI March 6, 2014,

Palestinian activists place a flag post in E1 east of Jerusalem, lying within area C of the West Bank

A United Nations report published Wednesday stated that the number of Palestinians living under full Israeli control in the West Bank is far higher than previously estimated, but an Israeli expert responsible for drawing the map in the mid-1990s said the UN was disingenuously inflating the numbers for political reasons.

The “Area C Vulnerability Profile” published by the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Occupied Palestinian Territories, known as OCHA, estimated that 297,900 Palestinians live in 532 residential areas in Area C, a subdivision of the West Bank with full Israeli security and administrative control. These areas, OCHA claimed, comprise “some of the most vulnerable communities in the West Bank in terms of humanitarian needs.”
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Dear Prime Minister Harper,

Over the past many years I have made many donations to various Israeli and Jewish charities. Unfortunately many of those were not recognized by CRA and I was not able to obtain a Canadian tax receipt.

Today I was asked to donate to a wonderful cause by an incredible political pundit by the name of Ted Belman who manages the Israpundit blog. In this case the charity is the Judea Samaria Fund.
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“I am a Muslim by faith, a Christian by spirit, a Jew by heart, and above all I am a human being.”~ Dr. Tawfik Hamid.

By Dr. Tawfik Hamid,
(Dr. Hamid is an Egyptian scholar and author of the article. The world needs more people like him—ones who have the courage to face-up to reality.)

I was born a Muslim and lived all my life as a follower of Islam.

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Mort Klein issued a press release which I posted using his title.
ZOA’s In-Person Election Process Is Required by law

I just received this rebuttal:

Ted, with all due respect to you, you are drinking the Koolaid about the need for an appear-in-person Continental Congress in Philadelphia.

They are using smoke and mirrors to tightly assure the outcome of this election.  I used to be a true believer in Mort.  He surely deserves credit where credit is due, but his dereliction of duty in not assuring the filing of federal returns for three consecutive years and thereby losing its non-profit status and reputation because of continual abuse over the years (and I am not speaking of the Leftist Forward, which we know is all too happy to bring him down). Read more…

Questions Mount Regarding Fairness of Upcoming Election at Oldest Pro-Israel Organization in America

LOS ANGELES, March 5, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — The following can be attributed to Steven Goldberg: A recent online poll of the Zionist Organization of America’s national membership resulted in a demonstration of overwhelming support for the challenger, Steven Goldberg. Conducted over a three-day period, and open to the participation of all organizational members with an email address on record, ZOA’s national constituency favored Goldberg by a margin of 78% to 22%. Given the opportunity to comment, most voters cited the need for change amid recent revelations of mismanagement and Mort Klein’s excessive compensation. Details are available at www.mortklein.com.
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