Secretary’s insistence on consensus, implied criticism of Netanyahu’s judicial overhaul reflect US concerns, but ex-envoy says Biden needs quiet to enable joint effort on Tehran

By LAZAR BERMAN, TOI     3 February 2023, 7:19 pm  <

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (right) meets with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Jerusalem on January 30, 2023. (Amos Ben Gershom/GPO)

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken isn’t the first senior US official to take shots at Israeli democracy.

Referencing gender segregation on Haredi buses and religious IDF soldiers walking out of a concert by a female singer, former US secretary of state Hillary Clinton in 2011 compared parts of Israel to Iran and the US south under Jim Crow laws.

Read more…

“It’s over,” said the late Hebrew U. antisemitism expert Robert Wistrich. “It’s a slow death.” It is actually speeding up. Op-ed.

By Giulio Meotti, INN

“With the number of Jews plummeting from 3,000 to 600 in just a few years, the Swedish city of Malmö is the barometer of the slow demise of European Jews after the Holocaust,” wrote the late great Holocaust historian Robert Wistrich.

He continued: “It is not for nothing that former European Commissioner Frits Bolkestein advised the Jewish community of Holland to emigrate to avoid harassment by young Muslim fanatics. The prospects in Belgium and Norway are no better. The verdict is on the wall, for anyone with eyes to see. The reward for Europe’s regrettable and cowardly appeasement of Islamism will, however, be short-lived. Because bowing down and willful blindness come at a high cost in the long run. Muslims will eventually take their revenge on a European society that the most fanatical among them already loathe.”

Read more…

Scott Ritter

Russia will win in 6 months.

Redacted with Clayton Morris

Despite subjecting Russia to the most comprehensive sanctions ever, Russia is getting stronger and the West is getting weaker.

by Benjamin Weinthal, The Jerusalem Report  January 28, 2023

https://www.meforum.org/64101/the-iran-revolt-has-sustainable-momentum-what

Veteran Iran experts have highlighted one crystal-clear difference between the current nationwide uprising against the clerical regime and previous protests: The revolt over the murder of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini on September 16 after she was arrested by the infamous morality police has sustainable momentum.

Read more…

By MWG, AM THINKER

There are two groups of Trump haters.

The first are what this writer terms, “The Weak Sister Crowd.” These are the whiners and crybabies who got their noses out of joint when Trump released a “mean” tweet that brought tears to their eyes. They’re the, “Trump said boo to the _____ (insert target group here), and I’m not going vote for him ever again” brainiacs.
Read more…

By Kenneth R. Timmerman, AM THINKER

Three events took place recently that have changed my view of an Israeli military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

For years now, I have answered with caution the warmongers and headline-grabbers who have gleefully touted impending Israeli airstrikes on Iran. I have stated, with reason and facts in support, that Israel has demonstrated repeatedly that it has many ways of slowing down Iran’s nuclear weapons programs short of a kinetic military strike.
Read more…

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (L) and France’s President Emmanuel Macron (R) prior to their meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris on February 2, 2023. (Ludovic Marin/AFP)

PARIS — French President Emmanuel Macron warned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Thursday night that if there are not changes to his government’s far-reaching plans to overhaul the judicial system, “Paris should conclude that Israel has emerged from a common conception of democracy,” an official with knowledge of the conversation confirmed.

Macron’s remarks, which were not included in the French readout of the meeting at the Elysee Palace, were first reported by Le Monde. An official updated on the details of meeting confirmed the report to The Times of Israel.

Read more…

Artifact from First Temple-era Judea seized from Jewish philanthropist’s collection declared ‘example of Palestinian cultural patrimony.’

By David Rosenberg, INN

US returns 2,700-year-old looted cosmetic spoon to Palestine

Israel’s new government is challenging the transfer by American authorities of a rare artifact from ancient Israel to the Palestinian Authority, after the item was seized from the collection of a prominent American Jewish philanthropist.

In 2017, a multinational investigation was launched into the collection of billionaire hedge funder and Birthright Israel cofounder Michael Steinhardt, amid allegations he had illegally acquired numerous artifacts and works of art.

Read more…

Israel Defense and Security Forum

Dr. Anat Hochberg Marom – Geopolitical expert for international relations and crisis management

Over the past decade, particularly in the past year since the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, Russia’s foreign policy has undergone dramatic change. Its involvement in current major geopolitical affairs and its vigorous activity across the international arena, leave little room for doubt – Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation, is investing great efforts into cementing Russia’s influence as a superpower and an important key player in global politics, by disrupting the existing status-quo and creating a new and challenging balance of power with the United States and the West.
Read more…

As the culture hurtles towards the precipice, Diaspora Jews are like rabbits caught in the headlights. Op-ed.

By Melanie Phillips

(JNS) In Britain’s House of Commons this week, MP Kim Johnson launched an attack on the “fascist Israeli government” and its “apartheid” policies.

Johnson is a Labour Party MP. You know, the same Labour Party whose current moderate leader, Sir Keir Starmer, has reputedly cleansed it of the Jew-hatred that exploded under its previous hard-left leader Jeremy Corbyn.

Following Johnson’s remarks, the Labour leadership leapt into immediate action. Within hours, Johnson was ordered to make a groveling apology.
Read more…

The Palestinian Arab flags, on unabashed and unhindered display at recent demonstrations against the proposed reform of Israel’s legal system, tear off the facade of hypocrisy that masks what really motivates them. 

By Dr. Martin Sherman   3.2.23

We need to understand that the High Court of Justice is one family. Even if there are different opinions, it is to the benefit of the State [of Israel] that there be a coherent Court, in which the relationships are like those of a family. Despite any differences, it is impossible to include someone who is not part of the system—Former President of Israel’s Supreme Court, Aharon Barak, at the annual conference of the Israeli Association of Public Law, December 1, 2016.

Read more…

ROBERT VAUGHAN interviews Salim Mansur

“The collective West has brought us to the precipice of a nuclear Armageddon.” So says our guest professor Salim Mansur.

Those seeking peace are searching the West in vain for any among its leaders, media, or intelligentsia calling for peace. All seem blinded by an irrational and unjustified Russophobia. The result is a general populace duped into thinking that this is a “just war” and Ukraine must win despite the threat of a nuclear conclusion.
Read more…

Attorney General Baharav-Miara issues 112-page opinion saying judicial reforms would give executive, legislative branches unlimited power.

Israel National News  2.2.23

Gali Baharav-MiaraShir Torem/Flash90

Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara issued a 112-page opinion Thursday afternoon in which she claimed that the government’s proposed judicial reforms would cause “serious damage to the system of checks and balances” between the three branches of government.

Baharav-Miara submitted her position to Justice Minister Yariv Levin and the Knesset Constitution Committee.

Read more…

by Dr. Amin Tarzi

BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 2,177, February 2, 2023

Read more…

By Amir Avivi, ISDF

I did an interview with Newsmax this week about the war games exercise that the United States is currently conducting with Israel. Click here to watch the interview.

I shared with them a very simply, but important message:
Read more…

The Left runs Oceania, and we work for their various bureaus.

By Victor Davis Hanson, AM GREATNESS      29.1.23

The 1960s revolution was both anarchic and nihilist. But it was waged against—29.1.23not from—the establishment. Hippies and the Left either attacked institutions or, in Timothy Leary fashion, chose to “turn on, tune in, drop out” from them.

The current revolution is much different—and far more dangerous—for at least three reasons.

The Establishment Is the Revolution

Read more…