Facing US pressure, Ramallah suffices with symbolic Security Council statement panning settlements, while Israel will agree to halt some, but not all, activity beyond Green Line

By JACOB MAGID, TOI    19 February 2023, 8:09 pm  

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (L), US Secretary of State Antony Blinken (C), and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. (Collage/AP)

The Biden administration has managed to coax the Palestinian Authority to withdraw its support from a UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate end to settlement activity, after convincing Israel to temporarily hold off on a handful of measures meant to further entrench its presence in the West Bank, four sources told The Times of Israel on Sunday.

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WHAT A TRAVESTY

Netanyahu government and Palestinian Authority reportedly reached deal, under heavy US pressure, to freeze ‘unilateral’ steps for months.

By David Rosenberg, INN 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has agreed to a number of concessions to the Palestinian Authority, as part of the Biden administration’s push to broker a deal between the two sides to lower tensions during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, Walla reported Sunday evening.

According to the report, two Biden administration officials say that the US has secured “understandings” with Jerusalem and Ramallah, under which both Israel and the Palestinian Authority will refrain from unilateral moves over the next few months.

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Scott Ritter Show
Scott interviews a former PM of Ukraine about what was before 2014 and what is now. INVALUABLE

The world still believes that the “two-state solution” is the way to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But when the Palestinians invoke this idea, they’re holding something back.

By Joel Fishman, JCPA

For decades, the “two-state solution” slogan has triggered a conditioned reflex. It has been widely accepted as the optimal solution to the war that the Arab world has waged against Israel. Each side, however, interprets the term differently. Only by tracing its origin can we understand its double meaning.

From the outset, the term was designed as a weapon, whose purpose was deception. Its facile appeal has remained because the general public is largely ignorant of the real motives behind it.

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Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli slammed U.S. Ambassador Tom Nides for saying that Israel should “pump the breaks” on its initiative.

Israeli Diaspora Affairs Minister Likud MK Amichai Chikli at the Knesset in Jerusalem, Dec. 28, 2022. Photo by Olivier Fitoussi/Flash90.

(February 19, 2023 / JNS) Israeli Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli rebuked U.S. Ambassador Tom Nides on Sunday, after the American envoy jumped into the debate over Jerusalem’s proposed judicial reform package.

“I say to the American ambassador, slam the breaks on yourself and mind your own business,” said Chikli regarding Nides’s call for the Israeli government to modify its initiative. “You’re not the sovereign here. We’d be happy to debate with you international or security affairs, but respect our democracy,” he added.
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(February 19, 2023 / JNS) In an op-ed on Friday in The Jerusalem Post, attorney Russell Avraham Shalev of the Kohelet Policy Forum explains what’s missing from Israeli President Isaac “Bougie” Herzog’s proposed judicial-reform compromise, despite its “many positive elements.”

“While Herzog sounded many of the right rhetorical points, [he didn’t] adequately address the central aim of the government’s reform legislation: putting an end to Israel’s juristocracy and restoring popular sovereignty,” writes Shalev, who goes on to describe how the Supreme Court has spent three decades expanding its powers, “without any legal or constitutional mandate,” causing an “ever-narrowing ability of [the country’s] citizens to rule themselves.”

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There are national security implications to the revolt against judicial reform.

By Brig. Gen. (res.) Amir Avivi, INN

(JNS) These are tense days in Israel, even by Israeli standards. Not since the days before the 2005 Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and the uprooting of 8,000 Israelis from their homes have there been such tensions and today there is the tangible threat that Israelis may use violence against their brothers to promote political aims.

Amongst the seemingly endless avalanche of letters of protest and warning, petitions by professional organizations and open letters by Israelis and foreigners alike against the government’s planned reform of the outsized and illegal reach of the judiciary, one special group of “formers” has me very worried. It is a group I myself belong to: The generals.

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T. Belman. The proposed resolution is not stronger than Res 2334. Both are Chap VI resolutions which have no enforcement mechanisms and are generally considered to have no binding force under international law.

Does it really matter if we are condemned again by the UNSC or by US who are making the same demands on us? If the US succeeds in stopping the resolution, we will become more beholden to them as they apply pressure on us to do as we are told.

PA president briefs secretary of state on Palestinian-backed Security Council measure calling for halt to Israeli activity in West Bank; Blinken later calls PM to update him

By JACOB MAGID, TOI 18 February 2023, 

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, left, meets with Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank town of Ramallah, Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2023. (Ronaldo Schemidt/Pool via AP)

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken phoned Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas on Saturday, as Washington seeks to thwart a Ramallah-backed UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate halt to Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank.

Later in the day, he called Netanyahu to update him on where things stood.

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By Daniel Greenfield, 19 Feb 2023

Chinese spy balloons have briefly captured the nation’s imagination, but they’re just another in a series of surveillance layers that begins with satellites and ends with phone apps. The spy balloons seem odd, but they reveal the thoroughness and dedication of Beijing’s data hounds who are not satisfied with hacking us, embedding thousands of spies in our universities and tech firms, but want that added edge with slow-motion spying on our bases and defenses.

The balloon may seem silly but it reveals a rigorous mindset that ought to be frightening.
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Gravitas supports the West in its fight with Ukraine. That makes this report all the more ominous.

The US wants to impose its will on the world.  This alliance wants to resist US hegemonic plans and wants to respect national differences.
“China’s deepening cooperation with Iran has an anti-hegemony and anti-bullying feature.

Both China and Iran uphold independent foreign policies firmly defend the principle of non-interference in internal affairs on international occasions.”

Most of the world agrees with them.

Prof. Rich Wolff
Yale Professor and Marxist, Richard Wolff gave a talk in which he argued that the entire West, including the United States, has failed to defeat Russia, and that the US has failed to learn from China’s rise to become a major competitor. China’s economy is growing much faster than that of the US, with an average annual growth rate of 6-9% compared to 2-3% for the US. The US has attempted to stop China’s rise by declaring a trade war and applying sanctions, but these measures have been unsuccessful.

Now, the US is in a war with Russia in Ukraine, which Wolff argues is an attempt to weaken Russia, which is China’s ally. The sanctions applied to Russia have not had the desired effect, and the Russian economy has rebounded from the initial dip. Wolff argues that the US is in denial about the changing world order, and that inequality in the US is continuing to get worse. This has led to explosions of anger and resentment among the population, which are expressed in crime, bitterness, and scapegoating. Wolff argues that the US needs to confront the reality of the changing world order and address the root causes of social and economic inequality.

Beijing will pitch its own peace plan. Europeans are predictably skeptical.

BY STUART LAU, HANS VON DER BURCHARD AND LILI BAYER, POLITICO  18.2.23

MUNICH — China is trying to drive a fresh wedge between Europe and the United States as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine trudges past its one-year mark.

Such was the motif of China’s newly promoted foreign policy chief Wang Yi when he broke the news at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday that President Xi Jinping would soon present a “peace proposal” to resolve what Beijing calls a conflict — not a war — between Moscow and Kyiv. And he pointedly urged his European audience to get on board and shun the Americans.

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TIERNEY’S REAL NEWS   17.2.23

We all know that Dominion voting systems is suing Fox News, Mike Lindell and others for reporting on the stolen election and implying that Dominion machines played a part in that scheme. Since 2020, tons of evidence has come out from video, eyewitness testimony, data analysis, machine analysis & whistleblowers to prove the election was stolen.

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T. Belman. The Left keeps fighting any rule that would suppress the vote such as requiring Voter ID. Now the C of A dismissed the argument that the machine screw up in republican dominated areas suppressed the vote because “voters were able to cast their ballots”. So much for “suppression of the vote”. We’ll see what the SC will do with that argument and all the other claims that were dismissed.

Lake Moves To Take Election Fraud Case To Arizona Supreme Court

by Liza Carlisle, REPUBLIC BRIEF    17.2.23

When Arizona Republican Kari Lake lost to Democrat insider Katie Hobbs in the November race for governor, there was voting chaos in the news in Maricopa county. As viewers watched, polls experienced problems with machines, sending voters to alternate locations and causing late and missing ballots. Hobbs was declared the governor in the match, but Lake has been protesting the integrity of the election ever since. So far, her lawsuits have not been successful in Arizona, the very state where all this occurred.

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By James Bacon, REVOLVER

Ever since President Trump announced his 2024 campaign, the mainstream media silence has been deafening — in stark contrast to the media frenzy that exploded in the aftermath of President Trump’s now legendary ride down the escalator. The mainstream media blackout of President Trump (which includes Fox News to a large degree) is only one such vector of attack from an establishment that is increasingly desperate to neutralize President Trump and the historic America First political movement he created.
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Lewis was a candidate for euthanasia and that if her mother chose not to pursue it, that would be “selfish,”

by Daniel Greenfield, FPM

Depressed? Lonely? Having trouble getting out of the house? Just kill yourself or have the government do it for you. Underage? Mentally unstable? The Canadian government will kill you too. No extra charge.

“Canada should expand assisted dying to include mature minors and patients with mental illnesses”

Mature minors who will never mature.

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By Anthony Gonzalez, AM THINKER

Former president Donald Trump’s 2024 campaign criticized former United Nations ambassador and South Carolina governor Nikki Haley (R) after she announced her candidacy for president.

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T. Belman. I find this shocking. What happened? I can’t believe it.

From CNN’s Devan Cole, Marshall Cohen, Katelyn Polantz and Tierney Sneed     18.2.23

Portions of the highly anticipated report from a special grand jury in Georgia that investigated Donald Trump’s actions in the state after the 2020 election were released Thursday, revealing two findings of its months long probe but leaving many key questions unaddressed.

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney ordered the limited release earlier this week, writing in his order that the report’s introduction and conclusion, as well as concerns the grand jury panel had about witnesses lying under oath, will be made public.

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By MARK SLEBODA, REAL POLITICK   18.2.23

It is widely acknowledged that the conflict in Ukraine has become a war of attrition fought to a very great degree with artillery, the proverbial “king of the battlefield”, returned to prominence.

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