No One Mentions That The Russian Trail Leads To Democratic Lobbyists
https://www.forbes.com

K Street lobbyists are the symbol of Washington influence-peddling as they push government for favors, subsidies, exemptions, and other special treatment for their clients. Their customers include, in addition to domestic clients, foreign governments, oligarchs, fugitive speculators, and a rogue’s gallery of questionable figures. Washington lobbyists trade on their access to power. Many are former administration officials or members of Congress. If Trump fulfills his promise to “drain the swamp,” these influence peddlers would have nothing to sell. They are under attack.
The media has focused not on K Street but on the Russian ties of President Donald Trump’s associates. They list the reprehensible Kremlin-associated figures for whom members of his inner circle worked, the most notorious being Viktor Yanukovich, the deposed president of Ukraine, and fugitive oligarch, Dymtro Firtash. But both of these “repulsive” figures were also advised by Democratic top dogs, who likely earned large multiples of what the “small fry” Trump associates took home.
In pushing its Manchurian-candidate-Trump narrative, the media fail to mention the much deeper ties of Democratic lobbyists to Russia. Don’t worry, the media seems to say: Even though they are representing Russia, the lobbyists are good upstanding citizens, not like the Trump people. They can be trusted with such delicate matters.
The media targeted former Trump campaign manager, Paul Manafort, for consulting for deposed Ukrainian president’s (Yanukovich’s) Party of the Regions. He also worked for billionaire oligarch, Firtash, who stands accused of skimming billions in the Ukraine gas trade in league with Russian oligarchs. The media also singled out Trump’s former national security advisor, General Michael Flynn, for attending a dinner with Putin and appearing on Russia’s foreign propaganda network RT. Trump’s own Russian ties were the subject of intense media coverage of an unverified opposition research report purportedly prepared by an ex-British spy, who remains in hiding. It seems no enterprising reporter has tried to find him.
The media’s focus on Trump’s Russian connections ignores the much more extensive and lucrative business relationships of top Democrats with Kremlin-associated oligarchs and companies. Thanks to the Panama Papers, we know that the Podesta Group (founded by John Podesta’s brother, Tony) lobbied for Russia’s largest bank, Sberbank. “Sberbank is the Kremlin, they don’t do anything major without Putin’s go-ahead, and they don’t tell him ‘no’ either,” explained a retired senior U.S. intelligence official. According to a Reuters report, Tony Podesta was “among the high-profile lobbyists registered to represent organizations backing Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich.” Among these was the European Center, which paid Podesta $900,000 for his lobbying.
That’s not all: The busy Podesta Group also represented Uranium One, a uranium company acquired by the Russian government which received approval from Hillary Clinton’s State Department to mine for uranium in the U.S. and gave Russia twenty percent control of US uranium. The New York Times reported Uranium One’s chairman, Frank Guistra, made significant donations to the Clinton Foundation, and Bill Clinton was paid $500,000 for one speech from a Russian investment bank that has “links to the Kremlin that was promoting Uranium One stock.”  Notably, Frank Giustra, the Clinton Foundation’s largest and most controversial donor, does not appear anywhere in Clinton’s “non-private” emails. It is possible that the emails of such key donors were automatically scrubbed to protect the Clinton Foundation.
Let’s not leave out fugitive Ukrainian oligarch, Dymtro Firtash. He is represented by Democratic heavyweight lawyer, Lanny Davis, who accused Trump of “inviting Putin to commit espionage” (Trump’s quip: If Putin has Hillary’s emails, release them) but denies all wrongdoing by Hillary.

That’s still not all: Rep. John Conyers (D., Mich.) read Kremlin propaganda into the Congressional Record, referring to Ukrainian militia as “repulsive Neo Nazis” in denying Ukrainian forces ManPad weapons. Conyers floor speech was surely a notable success of some Kremlin lobbyist.
Lobbying for Russia is a bi-partisan activity. Gazprombank GPB, a subsidiary of Russia’s third largest bank, Gazprombank, is represented by former Sen. John Breaux, (D., La.), and former Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R., Miss.), as main lobbyists on “banking laws and regulations, including applicable sanctions.” The Breaux-Lott client is currently in the Treasury Department list of Russian firms prohibited from debt financing with U.S. banks.
In his February 16 press conference, President Trump declared in response to the intensifying media drumbeat on his Russian connections: “I haven’t done anything for Russia.” K-Street lobbyists, on the other hand, have done a lot to help Russia. They greased the skids for a strategic deal (that required the Secretary of State’s approval) that multiplied the Kremlin’s command of world uranium supplies. They likely prevented the shipment of strategic weapons needed by Ukraine to repulse well-armed pro-Russian forces. A fugitive billionaire who robbed the Ukrainian people of billions is represented by one of the establishment’s most connected lawyers.
Gazprombank GPB hired Breux and Lott to gain repeal of sanctions. That’s perfectly fine in Washington; they are playing according established “swamp rules” in their tailored suits and fine D.C. restaurants. General Flynn lost his job when the subject of sanctions was mentioned by the Russian ambassador in their telephone conversation, but that’s the way the media and Washington play.
No wonder that Trump’s’ “drain the swamp” and anti-media messages resonate so well with mainstream America.

President Trump's Lawyer Responds to James Comey Testimony 6/8/17

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RW33q9cuKe8

 Qatar, Trump and double games

BY CAROLINE B. GLICK, JPOST

Arguably, Qatar’s role in undermining the stability of the Islamic world has been second only to Iran’s.




President Donald Trump has been attacked by his ubiquitous critics for his apparent about-face on the crisis surrounding Qatar.

In a Twitter post on Tuesday, Trump sided firmly with Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and the other Sunni states that cut diplomatic ties with Qatar and instituted an air and land blockade of the sheikhdom on Monday.

On Wednesday, Trump said that he hopes to mediate the dispute, more or less parroting the lines adopted by the State Department and the Pentagon which his Twitter posts disputed the day before.

To understand the apparent turnaround and why it is both understandable and probably not an about-face, it is important to understand the forces at play and the stakes involved in the Sunni Arab world’s showdown with Doha.

Arguably, Qatar’s role in undermining the stability of the Islamic world has been second only to Iran’s.

Beginning in the 1995, after the Pars gas field was discovered and quickly rendered Qatar the wealthiest state in the world, the Qatari regime set about undermining the Sunni regimes of the Arab world by among other things, waging a propaganda war against them and against their US ally and by massively funding terrorism.

The Qatari regime established Al Jazeera in 1996.

Despite its frequent denials, the regime has kept tight control on Al Jazeera’s messaging. That messaging has been unchanging since the network’s founding. The pan-Arab satellite station which reaches hundreds of millions of households in the region and worldwide, opposes the US’s allies in the Sunni Arab world. It supports the Muslim Brotherhood and every terrorist group spawned by it. It supports Iran and Hezbollah.

Al Jazeera is viciously anti-Israel and anti-Jewish.

It serves as a propaganda arm not only of al-Qaida and Hezbollah but of Hamas, Islamic Jihad and any other group that attacks the US, Israel, Europe and other Western targets.

Al Jazeera’s reporters have accompanied Hamas and Taliban forces in their wars against Israel and the US. After Israel released Hezbollah arch-terrorist Samir Kuntar from prison in exchange for the bodies of two IDF reservists, Al Jazeera’s Beirut bureau hosted an on-air party in his honor.

Al Jazeera was at the forefront of the propaganda campaign inciting against then-Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak in 2011 and against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2012. Its operations were widely credited with inciting their overthrow and installing in their places regimes controlled by the Muslim Brotherhood and other jihadist groups.

As for the regime itself, it has massively financed jihadist groups for more than 20 years. Qatar is a major bankroller not only of al-Qaida and Hamas but of militias associated with ISIS in Iraq and Syria. In a State Department cable from 2009 published by WikiLeaks, US diplomats referred to Qatar as the largest funder of terrorism in the world.

According to the Financial Times, the straw that broke the camel’s back for the Saudis and their allies was their discovery that in April, Qatar paid Iran, its Iraqi militias and al-Qaida forces in Syria up to a billion dollars to free members of the royal family held captive in southern Iraq and 50 terrorists held captive in Syria.

Given Qatar’s destabilizing and pernicious role in the region and worldwide in everything related to terrorism funding and incitement, Trump’s statement on Tuesday in support of the Sunnis against Qatar was entirely reasonable. What can the US do other than stand by its allies as they seek to coerce Qatar to end its destabilizing and dangerous practices? The case for supporting the Saudis, Egyptians, the UAE and the others against Qatar becomes all the more overwhelming given their demands.

The Sunnis are demanding that Qatar ditch its strategic alliance with Iran. They demand that Qatar end its financial support for terrorist groups and they demand that Qatar expel terrorists from its territory.

If Qatar is forced to abide by these demands, its abandonment of Iran in particular will constitute the single largest blow the regime in Tehran has absorbed in recent memory. Among other things, Qatar serves as Iran’s banker and diplomatic proxy.

If the story began and ended here, then Trump’s anti-Qatari stance would have been the obvious and only move. Beyond being the right thing to do, if Qatar’s regime is overthrown or emasculated, the development would mark the most significant achievement to date against the Iranian axis of jihad.

Unfortunately, the situation is not at all simple.

First there is the problem of Doha’s relations with key Americans and American institutions.

Ahead of the 2016 US elections, WikiLeaks published documents which disclosed that the emir of Qatar presented Bill Clinton with a $1 million check for the Clinton Foundation as a gift for his 65th birthday. During Hillary Clinton’s tenure as secretary of state, Qatar reportedly contributed some $6m. to the Clinton Foundation.

Clinton, for her part, was deeply supportive of the regime and of Al Jazeera. For instance, in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 2011, Clinton praised Al Jazeera for its leading role in fomenting and expanding the protests in Egypt that brought down Mubarak.

Clinton wasn’t the only one that Qatar singled out for generosity. Since the 1990s, Qatar has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in US universities. Six major US universities have campuses in Doha.

Then there is the Brookings Institution. The premier US think tank had a revolving door relationship with the Obama and Clinton administrations.

In 2014, The New York Times reported that Brookings, which opened a branch in Doha in 2002, had received millions of dollars in contributions from Qatar. In 2013 alone, the Qatari regime contributed $14.8 million to Brookings.

Not surprisingly, Brookings’ scholars supported the overthrow of Mubarak, and supported the Muslim Brotherhood regime during its year in power. Brookings scholars urged the Obama administration to cut off military assistance to Egypt after the military overthrew the Muslim Brotherhood in 2013.

Brookings scholars have similarly written sympathetically of Qatar and its ally Turkey. As the Investigative Project on Terrorism revealed in a four-part series on Brookings’ relations with Qatar in 2014, Brookings’ scholars ignored human rights abuses by Qatar and praised Turkey’s Erdogan regime as behaving like the US in enabling religion to have a role in public life.

It is likely that given then-president Barack Obama’s strategic goal of reorienting US Middle East policy away from its traditional Sunni allies and Israel toward Iran and its allies in Qatar and Turkey, that Brookings, Clinton and other beneficiaries of Qatar’s generosity were simply knocking on an open door. Indeed, in 2014, during Operation Protective Edge, the Obama administration’s alliance with Qatar, Turkey and Iran against Sunnis and Israel came out of the shadows.

During the Hamas war with Israel, Obama sought to dislodge Egypt from its traditional role as mediator between Israel and Hamas and replace it with Qatar and Turkey. For their part, both regimes, which fund and support Hamas, accepted all of Hamas’s cease-fire demands against Israel and Egypt. As their partner, the Obama administration also supported Hamas’s demands.

Had Egypt and Israel bowed to those demands, Hamas would have achieved a strategic victory in its war against Israel and Egypt. To avoid buckling to US pressure, Egypt built a coalition with the same states that are now leading the charge against Qatar – Saudi Arabia and the UAE – and openly supported Israel.

In the end, the standoff between the two sides caused the war to end in a draw. Hamas was not dismantled, but it failed to secure Israeli or Egyptian acceptance of any of its demands for open borders and access to the international banking system.

Given that Trump is not aligned with Brookings, the Clinton Foundation or US academia, it could be argued that he is not beholden to Qatari money in any way.

But unfortunately, they are not the only beneficiaries of Qatari largesse.

There is also the Pentagon.

In the 1990s, Qatar spent more than $1b. constructing the Al Udeid Air Base outside of Doha.

It is the most sophisticated air force base in the region. In 2003, the base replaced Saudi Arabia’s Prince Sultan Air Base as headquarters for the US military’s Central Command. Since 2003, all US operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria are controlled from the base.

Following Trump’s Twitter postings, the Pentagon was quick to say that operations at Al Udeid base had not been influenced by the crisis between Qatar and its neighbors. The Pentagon spokesman refused to say whether or not Qatar sponsors terrorism.

Instead, Capt. Chris Davis stated, “I consider them a host to our very important base at Al Udeid.” He commended Qatar for hosting US forces and for its “enduring commitment to regional security.”

Also on Tuesday, according to the Egyptian media, Iran deployed Revolutionary Guard Corps forces to Doha to protect the emir and his palace.

On Wednesday, Turkey’s parliament voted to empower Erdogan to deploy forces to Qatar to protect the regime.

The moves by Qatar’s allies Iran and Turkey significantly raise the stakes in the contest of wills now at play between Qatar and its Sunni neighbors and adversaries.

With Iranian forces guarding the palace and the emir, the possibility of a bloodless coup inside the Al Thani family has been significantly diminished.

Any move against the emir will raise the prospect of an open war with Iran.

So, too, if Egypt and Saudi Arabia invade or otherwise attack Qatar, with or without US support, the US risks seeing its Arab allies at war with its NATO ally Turkey.

Under the circumstances, Trump’s refusal to endorse Article 5 of the NATO treaty during his speech in Brussels appears wise and well-considered.

Article 5 states that an attack against one NATO ally represents an attack against all NATO allies.

With the Pentagon dependent on the Qatari base, and with no clear path for unseating the emir through war or coup without risking a much larger and more dangerous conflict, the only clear option is a negotiated resolution.

Under the circumstances, the best the US can probably work toward openly is a diminishment of Qatar’s regional profile and financial support for Iran and its terrorist allies and proxies. Hence, Trump’s announcement on Wednesday that he will mediate the conflict.

However, in the medium and long term, Trump’s statement on Twitter made clear his ultimate goal.

www.CarolineGlick.com

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THE GREAT VICTORY: SIX DAYS AND 50 YEARS

GILAD SHARON  JERUSELEM POST   JUNE 5, 2017 

Let’s say we withdrew from the territories after the war. What would have happened?

Too many Israelis lament our victory in the Six Day War. There are also people who say that we should have withdrawn from all the territories immediately after the war. To the former, let it be said that if the Arabs had won the war, questions regarding the morality and humanity of their governing of the Jews would never have arisen, simply because the only Jews who would still be alive around here are those who could breathe underwater.

The latter should be reminded of conditions before the war: a State of Israel with a border just beyond the suburbs of Tel Aviv, no more than 15 km. wide in the region of Netanya; a narrow corridor to Jerusalem with no alternative access and no Latrun; constant firing on Kibbutz Tel Katzir in the north, on the fishermen in the Sea of Galilee, and on the communities in the Hula Valley; Palestinian terrorism that couldn’t yet rely on the excuse of the “occupation” to justify itself. “The last one to leave has to turn out the light,” was a common phrase.

Is there anyone who wants to return to that situation? All our current problems notwithstanding, we are a thousand times better off now than we were then.

Precisely who prevented the Palestinians from establishing their own state in the 19 years between the War of Independence and the Six Day War? Even earlier, who prevented them from accepting the Partition Plan? Thousands of lives could have been saved and a Palestinian state would have been born the same year as Israel. 

There wouldn’t be a single Palestinian refugee, and all the territory they are demanding now – and more – would already be theirs. But they never even considered that option. Why not? Because they weren’t interested in a state of their own, only in destroying ours.

Let’s say we withdrew from the territories after the war. What would have happened? Would the Arab hostility toward us have faded into thin air? No. We would have had to go back to risking our lives along borders that didn’t allow an inch of breathing space, while they continued to declare their arrogant goal of annihilating the “Zionist entity.” What conclusion would they have drawn? That launching a war against us is a viable option, with no downside. If they win, they throw the Jews into the sea; if they lose, there’s no price to pay.

Nevertheless, the question remains: what do we do now? We still need a glimmer of hope. The good news is that although we don’t have a lot of wiggle room, there is something we can do, as long as we stay true to two principles. The first is that we’re not going to return to the 1967 borders.

That isn’t an option. The second is that the Palestinians in Judea and Samaria will not become Israeli citizens. That would be the end of the country. Aside from that, it doesn’t matter if the solution involves the Palestinian state that already exists in Jordan or some sort of arrangement in Areas A and B. But one thing has to be clear: the future of Area C will not be the same as the future of Areas A and B, nor will the civil definition of the Palestinians in them. We simply have no other choice.

Don’t beat yourselves up over our victory in the Six Day War. On the contrary, savor it. The alternative would have been much worse.

Translated from Hebrew by Sara Kitai, skitai@ kardis.co.il.

They Are Neither ‘Losers,’ ‘Nihilists,’ ‘Worshipers Of Death,’ Nor ‘Sick Cowards’ By: Yigal Carmon, MEMRI

They Are Neither ‘Losers,’ ‘Nihilists,’ ‘Worshipers Of Death,’ Nor ‘Sick Cowards’
By: Yigal Carmon, MEMRI

– But Rather Believers And Idealists Who Commit Horrific Murders For A Cause And Sacrifice Their Lives For A Utopian Future: A World Ruled By Their Faith


Just like Barack Obama, Francois Hollande and David Cameron, who denied that the jihadi bombings in the West were in any way connected to religion, Donald Trump and Theresa May now also insist on mischaracterizing the jihadi phenomenon, calling the jihadis by different names such as “evil losers” (Trump) and “sick cowards” (May).

During his campaign Trump spoke in different terms (“radical Islamic terrorism”) – but since then he has evidently adopted the approach favored by the other Western leaders, who consider any reference to the religious roots of terror as “unhelpful.” Like them, he is apparently motivated by the understandable need to avoid offending 1.4 billion Muslims.

So first, let’s put forward the true, if “unhelpful,” definition. The jihadis who perpetrate these horrific crimes are neither losers, nor nihilists, nor worshippers of death, nor sick cowards. On the contrary, the overwhelming majority of them are devout and fanatic believers. They are idealists who sacrifice their lives for the sake of a utopian future: a world ruled by their faith. The attacks they commit are extreme acts of piety. They seek to emulate the dedication of the early believers in order to revive the glory and grandeur of the past. In fact, as part of their training, many suicide bombers adopt a pious lifestyle: they immerse themselves in prayer, help the needy in their society, pay all their debts,[1] and become moral and religious role models for others (see the Appendix of this document for the last statement of the suicide-bomber Hanadi Jaradat, who committed mass murder in a Haifa restaurant and began her will with the religious formula, “in the name of Allah the Merciful and Compassionate”).

Contrary to the approach of the Western leaders, who blame the evil character of the perpetrators while absolving the faith they follow, the truth is that these perpetrators, by the standards of their own belief, are virtuous people who follow the directives of the Koran [48:29]: “Be fierce towards the infidels, merciful towards each other.” The problem lies not in the perpetrators’ innate character but in some of the core values of their religious belief system. Indeed, their faith – any faith – includes elements that are beautiful alongside elements that are malevolent. Denying that these malevolent elements are part of the faith, as the Western leaders do, is wrong. It is such denial that is unhelpful; in fact, it is self-deception.

Can the mischaracterization of the terrorists’ acts actually achieve the goal of avoiding offense to the world’s Muslims? The answer is no. Faced with the Western leaders’ statements that totally disassociate the jihadis’ acts from their religious roots, the world’s Muslims can only conclude that Western leaders do not understand their faith and have the intellectual conceit to mischaracterize it. In fact, this mischaracterization denies some of the core values that underpinned the great achievements of Islam in which Muslims take pride: the establishment a great civilization and the building of not one empire but several in the course of history.

It would be far more respectful to Muslims to acknowledge that these values (of self-sacrifice and extreme dedication aimed at spreading the faith by force) were the basis of Islam’s expansion, just as the spread of Christianity, after the Emperor Constantine established it as the state religion, was based on a similar process of imposing the faith by force. However, Christianity has since renounced these values. Christianity does not deny its past, but it has jettisoned the element of coercion. Similarly, Western leaders must not denigrate the Muslim past by denying its core values, but rather should demand that Muslims follow the same path: realize that some violent values that underpinned their civilization and glorious past are incompatible with modern morality. Western leaders should therefore demand that contemporary Muslims focus on other aspects of their faith (as Christianity has done), and totally reject imposing their religious utopian vision by the force of arms.

Western leaders cannot expect to defeat “terrorism” in their countries when they deny and evade acknowledging the roots of the jihadi phenomenon: the deep connection of the attacks to the faith. Admitting this connection will not only be more respectful to Muslims, it will also be conducive to reforms and useful to Muslim reformists, who acknowledge that the terrorists’ ideals come from within: from the houses of worship, the schools and society at large. Being truthful towards the Muslims is more respectful than denial. It will also be much more helpful, since only discarding the completely unnecessary hypocrisy regarding the roots of Islamic terror will help Muslims adopt a normal attitude towards their past: pride in its achievements, along with the necessary criticism of the archaic values that led to these achievements. Muslims should accept a post-caliphate role for themselves[2] just like all European states have reconciled themselves to post-imperial status. This is an admittedly painful process but it is an unavoidable one. The most senior Muslim religious leaders should seek a Muslim aggiornamento (a bringing up to date of the religion) along the lines of the reforms introduced by Pope John XXIII.

These messages should be delivered by Western leaders openly and insistently, in lieu of the intellectual evasion and denial practiced today. It should be emphasized that this demand is not addressed exclusively to Muslims. It is a demand that the West and Christianity have applied to themselves, and therefore have every right to demand it of the Muslim world. Only thus will the ideological base of jihad be eradicated and “terrorism” significantly decline. Needless to say, this is a long-term process, but it is nevertheless the genuine solution to the problem and the only way to produce results.

In translating this insight into concrete policies, two steps seem to be immediately necessary.

First, Western leaders must cease the hypocritical denial of jihad’s deep connection to faith, and firmly and openly demand that the leaders of the Muslim world take significant steps to reform the religion.

Second – and this is up to them alone – they must enact legislation to stop the jihadi use of the Internet, which has been powering the spread of jihadi ideology for over a decade. They must disregard all the corporate excuses, that this is impossible or incompatible with free speech. Free speech does not permit incitement to murder, including faith-based incitement. They should honor the international conventions against genocide and not allow the Internet companies to flout the laws of democratic countries. For a detailed strategy for purging the Internet of jihadi incitement, see MEMRI Daily Brief No. 126, An Internet Clean Of Jihadi Incitement – Not Mission Impossible, May 1, 2017.

Comment: This prescription doesn’t go near far enough. They should criminalize anything supportive of Islamic supremacy or of Jihad whether the stealth kind or the violent kind. It should be a crime to promote Islam.

Appendix: The Will of Hanadi Jaradat

The following is the transcript of the videotaped “last will and testament” of HanadiJaradat, who carried out the Maxim Restaurant suicide bombing in Haifa on October 4, 2003. The transcript was posted on the Islamic Jihad website, at http://www.qudsway.com/Links/Jehad/7/Html_Jehad7/hinadi/hinadi2/hinadi_qudsnet_003.htm

“The last will and testament of the Martyr Hanadi [Jaradat], before she set off to carry out the Haifa operation:

“In the name of Allah the Merciful and Compassionate, prayer and peace be upon the master of mankind, our master Muhammad, may Allah pray for him and give him peace:

“The Exalted One said [in the Koran]: ‘Do not consider those who died for the cause of Allah as dead, rather as alive, at their Lord sustained.’ [Koran 3:169]. Verily, Allah’s words are true.

“Dear family, whom the Lord of the world will reward as He promised us all in His Holy Book [with the words], ‘Give glad tidings to those who persevere.’ [Koran 2:155]. Indeed, Allah promised Paradise to those who persevere in all that He has brought upon them – and what a good dwelling Paradise it is.

“Therefore, reckon my sacrifice in anticipation of the reward of Allah, praised and exalted be He, to you in the Hereafter. I should not be too valuable to sacrifice myself for the religion of Allah. I have always believed in what is said in the Holy Koran, and I have been yearning for the rivers of Paradise, and I have been yearning to see the glorious light of Allah’s face. I have been yearning for all this ever since Allah bestowed guidance upon me.

“My loved ones, for whom I wish to vouchsafe [for entering Paradise] on the great Day of Judgment, I have chosen this way of my own full will, and I have striven greatly for this, until Allah bestowed martyrdom upon me, Allah willing. Martyrdom is not [given] to everyone on earth; rather, it is for those who are honored by Allah. Will you then be grieved because Allah honored me with it? Will you repay Allah with [thoughts] which He will not like, nor will I like? Reckon my sacrifice in anticipation of Allah’s reward for you in the Hereafter, and say, ‘There is no power or might save by Allah. We belong to Allah, and it is to Him that we return.’

“All of us are destined to die, and no one lives forever on this earth. However, he who is intelligent responds to Allah’s call. This is only a land of Jihad, and we live in it for Jihad, so that perhaps we will be able to remove the injustice under which we have been living in recent years.

“I know that I shall not bring back Palestine. I fully know this. However, I know that this is my duty for Allah. Believing in the principles of my faith, I respond to the call. I now inform you that, Allah willing, I shall find what Allah has promised to me and to all those who take this path – gardens which Allah promised us, in which we will live forever, Allah willing.

“Having believed in this, how do you think I can accept all the passing worldly temptations? How can I go on living on this earth when my spirit has become attached to an Omnipotent King? My entire aspiration has become to see the glorious light of Allah. It is His land and it is His religion, but they want to extinguish His light. We all know this.

“It is therefore my duty to the religion of Allah – and my obligation to Him – to defend it. I have nothing before me other than this body, which I am going to turn into slivers that will tear out the heart of everyone who has tried to uproot us from our country. Everyone who sows death for us will receive death, even though it be a small part [of what they deserve].

“We are still weak in the estimation of the powerful one. But we have our faith. Our belief makes us renew our covenant with our Lord and our land. Our war against them is a war of faith and existence, and not of borders. You know this well.

“My dear beloved father, please honor my desire and reckon my sacrifice in anticipation of Allah’s reward for you in the Hereafter.Whoever helped me to reach Paradise shall be rewarded by my vouchsafing for him [to enter Paradise]. Make me always reassured and proud of the father whose daughter I am, before my Lord and all mankind. I pray thee, dear father, by Allah’s glory, give me rest in my grave, and do naught but reckon my sacrifice in anticipation of Allah’s reward for you in the Hereafter. For Allah giveth and Allah taketh away, and we belong to Allah and to Him we all return.

“Dear mother, I wish to Allah that you will persevere, my mother, for I love you because you have always been endlessly giving. Allah willing, you shall continue to be this way. Reckon my sacrifice in anticipation of Allah’s reward for you in the Hereafter. I am going to be with Fadi, Salih, and Abd Al-Rahim and all those whom Allah has chosen to be near him. Reckon us all as sacrifices in anticipation of Allah’s reward for you in the Hereafter, and say, Allah, redeem me from my plight and reward me for my plight and give me good recompense for it.

“I ask everyone to forgive me for whatever I may have done [to offend them]. For my part, I have already forgiven everyone, and I ask of you the following: Pay 50 dinars to a dress shop in Jarash, pay 100 dinars to so-and-so in Qabatiya, and give 10 dinars [to charity] for my soul [as atonement], for I have forgotten a debt of a few piasters in Jordan and I do not remember it, and pray always for me for Allah’s mercy and forgiveness and contentment. May you always be content with me, my parents, and au revoir in the gardens of Paradise.

“Allah said, ‘Therefore let those fight in the way of Allah, who sell this world’s life for the Hereafter; and whoever fights in the way of Allah, then be he slain or be he victorious, We shall grant him a mighty reward’ [Koran 4:74].”

[1] According to the Hadith, this is one of the duties of the mujahid. See Rudolph Peters, Islam and Colonialism: The Doctrine of Jihad in Modern History (Religion and Society, no. 20). The Hague and New York: Mouton Publishers, 1979, pp. 11, 12, 18.

[2] Saudi reformist Turki Al-Hamad made similar arguments in an interview that aired on Rotana Khalijiyya TV on July 13-14, 2015. He said: “Take a look at any Islamist group – they are always saying that their number one goal is to reestablish the Caliphate. The Caliphate is history. It is over and done with.”

Interviewer: “It is impossible to revive it.”

Turki Al-Hamad: “Impossible. You cannot lump together a Malaysian, a Saudi, and an Egyptian, and impose a caliph upon them, giving him absolute authorities. This is impossible, but they refuse to accept it, and they live the myth of the Caliphate. I call it a myth because it will never happen. Ultimately, they will hit the brick wall of reality. A nation state is the foundation for everything. If you make it stable and prosperous, and if this state guarantees people’s rights, it can become a model state. If each state were to focus on its own affairs, the world would be a beautiful place. But if each state tries to impose its own model upon the rest of the world, disorder ensues, and Iran is an example.”

SOME MORE WISDOM FROM RABBI DOV FISCHER

Finally: Time for Trump to Put Whining Democrats in Their Place

By Rabbi Dov Fischer June 4, 2017

http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2017/06/finally_time_for_trump_to_put_whining_democrats_in_their_place.html

 

In the synagogue business, the few rabbis who are unfortunate enough to practice at one of the few undesirable congregations with grumbling and carping congregants (probably not at all different from what some similarly unfortunate pastors encounter among those outlier church flocks pocked with sociologically pathological congregants) are told that nothing puts the grumbles to an end like a successful building campaign.  Just get everyone absorbed with raising funds and building something – anything: a wing, an annex, a revamp of the whole building, a re-furnishing of the sanctuary...just get them all busy on a project, building something, doing something.  Keep them busy with something constructive, and they will stop grousing.

We call it the "Edifice Complex."

No fair observer can doubt that President Trump is a victim of a merciless witch hunt, with no end in sight until he is back hosting The Apprentice.  Remarkably, his approval ratings remain steady around 39 percent, the same number from before "Comey" this and "Flynn" that, before head counts at inaugurations and leaked phone calls to Australian and Mexican heads of government.  All the witch-hunting has solidified his base, and it has moved mild supporters into his camp.  Recently, Ann Coulter titled a weekly column "Every Time I Try to Be Mad at Trump, the Media Pull Me Back."    

Amen.

As the president continued his travels abroad from the respective centers of the world's three most influential religions to NATO world leaders, the media followed, seeking to portray him as a rube on foreign affairs, much as they have tried to depict him on domestic matters.  We needed not doubt that, by the time he returned, the left-Democrat "Resistance" and their media stooges would be accusing Trump of having sown discord abroad, even as his supporters exhaled with joy that, finally, a strong voice of American pride had traveled overseas to assert American greatness.

The media loved the Obama model for world leadership.  In the aftermath of the Charlie Hebdo massacre, send John Kerry to France with James Taylor singing "You've Got a Friend."  Obama meeting with Russians, asking them to tell "Vladimir" that Obama will cut sucker deals that hurt America after he gets re-elected.  Obama going to England and shocking the British public by continuing to ramble into a microphone while the orchestra deferentially played "God Save the Queen" in Elizabeth's presence.  Obama going to Communist Cuba and dancing the salsa in front of Castro.  And always, everywhere, apologizing for America and promising to cut America down to size so that we no longer tower over Europe and Asia and Africa and the Middle East.

I prefer a "rube" like Donald Trump, who leads from the front, drops a MOAB explosive on an ISIS hideout and terror base in Afghanistan that had been a mountain earlier in the day, and orders 59 cruise missiles launched into Syria to enforce a red line against poison weapons that he does not even have to warn about.

Now that he has returned home, the president should turn his attention to the Edifice Complex.  His administration needs to get moving on some serious legislation.  He has done great with executive orders and Cabinet and court appointments, but the time now is for some solid legislation, some real building.  He is way behind on filling scores of open federal district judgeships and openings in the federal judicial appellate circuits.  If he would only get those seats filled with the kind of judges he wants, he and the Republicans actually would start winning more federal case appeals, and justice would move back from the Obama imbalance.  Similarly, it is time for legislative initiatives like tax reform.  Once he and the GOP start getting some "building campaigns" going – health care something-or-other, real tax reform, some construction going on the border, infrastructure work – people will become engaged in that and see "stuff" happening.

It works in churches; it works in synagogues.  Get started on building some of that wall. There is nothing like a building campaign.  Maybe even sell plaques for donors to put their names on: "This brick donated by Sadie and Izzy Feldstein."

The Democrats have not been this angry since the Republicans took away their slaves.  They aim to tie up the president with one nonsensical non-scandal after another.  They allowed Eric Holder's "Fast and Furious" pass without special counsel.  No special counsel to investigate Lois Lerner and the IRS targeting of politically conservative associations.  No investigation of the Clinton bathroom email server, nor of the Huma Abedin emails of secure intelligence to her crazy husband, Carlos Danger, who not only lacked security clearance to see those emails, but was ripe to be extorted for all kinds of mischief.  No special counsel to investigate connections between Bill Clinton's million-dollar speaking engagements in the Putin universe and the concomitant conveyance of American uranium – the stuff of nuclear weapons – to the Russians.  Yet the Democrats – call them the "Obstructocrats" – now call for nothing but to impeach the president under any guise, for any reason, and just tie him up defending himself.

I cannot recall any time in the modern era, in any Western democracy, where the losing party declared itself "The Resistance" instead of the "Loyal Opposition."

In the end, it may take two things to determine whether Mr. Trump ultimately is going to be the president he set out to be and for which we elected him: (i) the midterm elections in 2018 and (ii) finally finishing what Harry Reid started and, for once and for all, ending the filibuster rule completely, even as that archaic and unconstitutional obstacle applies to legislation, too.

Certainly, the party in power typically sustains midterm losses.  If the GOP manages to hold the House and gains some of those Democrat Senate seats in red states without losing more than one or two GOP Senate seats, then President Trump will emerge with enormous authority to move forward.  It will mean that two years of concerted Democrat obstruction, which seems so successful to them and their media echo chamber in D.C., actually will not have advanced leftist interests.  The president's strength will be all the more enhanced if the GOP holds all but one or two of its Senate seats and sweeps a boatload of the red-state Democrat Senate seats.  It will be a definitive statement that, for all the garbage and "Resistance" and left op-eds and editorials, the voters outside the Beltway did not buy and are not buying any of the daily character assassinations.  It will assure President Trump and the GOP enormous momentum going forward.

By contrast, if the Democrats do well in the midterm House voting, even if they do not recapture the House but chart substantial gains, and if they hold most of their red-state Senate seats and even scoop a few of the GOP Senate seats, then they will be emboldened to intensify "The Resistance" toward 2020, and the president will be stymied.

Even so, and even then, it is one thing for voters to tell Quinnipiac and Rasmussen that they are disappointed in or do not approve of Mr. Trump (especially when the survey questions are worded in a way to elicit that response).  Quite another thing when the same voters are faced with the actual – not theoretical – alternatives for leadership: Bernie, Elizabeth Warren, other misfits and public nuisances of that ilk.  One remembers back to Richard Nixon being re-elected in 1972 by the biggest landslide ever because his opponent was Sen. George McGovern, who was not likeable, not impressive, and quite radical by the day's standards.

With or without "The Resistance," if President Trump gets re-elected in 2020, there will be hell to pay, because this man takes down names.  By then, he absolutely will be pressed to end the filibuster nonsense, finally, assuming that the GOP holds the Senate.

There is some value to a filibuster rule when it is used sparingly and judiciously.  Moreover, all sober-minded conservatives recognize that politics is cyclical, and one day the Democrats again will hold power.  But we also know that the filibuster, which has no basis in the Constitution, never was meant to require that each and every bill muster at least a 60-percent super-majority.  Rather, it was intended for the one or two moments in a term when a bill of constitutional moment was on the line, and the rule required the filibustering senator to hold the floor and speak 24 hours a day, with support from colleagues.  It never was meant for a "Resistance" to prevent a majority party from getting anything done for eight years.

In the meantime, let's get some donors to get the building fund rolling.

Rabbi Dov Fischer, an attorney and adjunct professor of law, is a senior rabbinic fellow at the Coalition for Jewish Values, congregational rabbi of Young Israel of Orange County, California, and holds prominent leadership roles in several national rabbinic and other Jewish organizations.  He has been chief articles editor of the UCLA Law Review, clerked for the Hon. Danny J. Boggs in the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, and served for most of the past decade on the Executive Committee of the Rabbinical Council of America.  His writings have appeared in The Weekly Standard, National Review, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, the Jerusalem Post, American Greatness, Frontpage Magazine, American Thinker, and Israel National News.  Other of his writings are collected at www.rabbidov.com.

Europe’s Next Big War .... Thousands of terrorists and thousands of soldiers.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/266852/europes-next-big-war-daniel-greenfield

Europe’s Next Big War

Thousands of terrorists and thousands of soldiers.

By Daniel Greenfield - June 2, 2017

Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is a New York writer focusing on the radical left and Islamic terrorism.

2,000 cases.

That was the most overlooked revelation to come from the testimony of the former FBI director. While the media parsed every Comey hiccup to bolster its election conspiracy theories, it ignored that number.

Comey stated that there were around 2,000 terrorism investigations. 1,000 of those came from “home grown violent extremism” with no evidence of contact with foreign terrorists. Another 1,000 had "some contact with foreign terrorists". 300 from that 2,000 had come to America as refugees.

Two-thirds of the refugee terrorists were from Iraq. The other third were mainly from the six countries named in President Trump’s travel pause which left-wing activist judges have unconstitutionally halted.

Two years ago, Comey listed around 900 investigations. Even assuming that some of the 1,000 “home grown extremists” aren’t Muslim terrorists, that’s a staggering and shocking rise in case numbers.

Back then, he had said that the FBI was having trouble with the sheer volume of investigations in every state. "If that becomes the new normal," he had said, "that would be hard to keep up."

The new normal is only getting worse.

Those 2,000 investigations represent active cases. When an investigation does not pan out, it’s over. The FBI investigated Omar Mateen before he carried out the Pulse massacre where the second-generation refugee murdered 49 people, according to his own words, “in the name of Allah, the merciful.”

A preliminary investigation has to be wrapped up in six months. A year at the most. Mateen’s investigation was wrapped up in the spring of ’14. His name went off the terror watchlist

.

Two years later he struck.

Those 2,000 cases are the tip of a very large iceberg. Below those 2,000 cases are the larger numbers of potential terrorists who, like Mateen, had the book closed on their investigations.

In the UK, there are 3,000 potential terrorists being investigated, but 20,000 others had been “subjects of interest” in the past. We don’t know how large that second number is in the United States. But it’s probably not too far off the British one. In which case we also have over 20,000 potential terrorists.

Nor do we know how large the third number of potential terrorists who never appeared on the radar is.

Against these numbers, MI5, which handles counterterrorism in the UK, has 4,000 staffers. Only a small fraction of these would be employed in counterterrorism in MI5’s G Branch. London’s Counter Terrorism Command has a staff of 1,500. The Greater Manchester Police’s counter-terrorism unit had a team of 20. These numbers are obviously inadequate. 

But what number could possibly be enough?

The British military can put 10,000 soldiers on city streets after a terrorist attack. After Manchester, 5,000 soldiers were deployed. SAS special forces are reportedly being permanently positioned in London. The military was deployed for the first time in a century when Tony Blair sent tanks to secure Heathrow Airport after an Islamic terror threat. Now military deployment is becoming the new normal.

France deployed 10,000 soldiers to patrol cities after the Paris attacks. 

Operation Sentinelle is still underway two years later. Soldiers patrolling Paris are awarded a medal for Protection of the Territory. Half of the French soldiers deployed in a military role are patrolling the streets of Paris and other cities.

Belgium and Italy also deployed troops in Brussels and Rome in 2015.

The forces being deployed include such storied names as the French 35th Infantry Regiment, one of the country’s oldest regiments with a history dating back to the 17^th century, the Irish Guards at Whitehall and the legendary Chasseurs Ardennais in Belgium. 

This is not counterterrorism. It’s a war.

In 2015, the year of many of these military deployments, 211 terror plots occurred in EU countries. These attacks killed 151 people and wounded another 360. 1,077 terrorism arrests were made.

Those numbers are closer to Iraq than anything in the West. And they are only growing worse.

Obama tried to dismiss Islamic terrorism as a criminal problem. But when soldiers are being deployed in major cities, it’s not crime. It’s an insurgency. The Islamic insurgency from Iraq was exported to America by Iraqi refugees as the FBI’s own numbers show. Islamic insurgencies from Pakistan, Libya and Algeria have been exported to Europe in the same way. Islamic immigration has brought its insurgency here.

These insurgencies form around Muslim population centers. Manchester’s Muslim population nearly doubled in a decade. Toward the end of that decade, a Muslim plot to bomb a shopping mall in Manchester on the Easter Bank Holiday was broken up. That plot failed. Another one succeeded.

These insurgencies are not a police problem. They are a military threat.

A Muslim terrorist network in London, Paris or New York is as much of a military issue as one in Baghdad or Beirut. The infrastructure of investigations and trials we have set up to fight these networks is utterly unsuited to the nature of the problem of Islamic terrorism and overwhelmed by its growing scope.

The question is do we want to turn our cities into Baghdad with thousands of soldiers patrolling our streets? Rising Muslim domestic insurgencies will leave even the most liberal leaders with no choice but to resort to wartime measures. Even in America this has meant the TSA, the NSA and a host of other restrictions and violations. Yet these are inescapable unless the root cause of the insurgency is tackled.

If things go on as they are, the military occupation of our cities becomes permanent.

The great cities of the West crumble into a maze of insurgency and counterinsurgency operations with thousands of soldiers on the street securing safe green zones and venturing for raids into no go zones. Those soldiers stop just patrolling and occasionally responding to attacks. Instead they will be employed in manning checkpoints and deterring groups of armed insurgents from carrying out major attacks.

200 terror plots will become 2,000 terror plots. 151 dead will become 1,500 dead and then 15,000 dead. And then every Western country that opened its doors to “refugees” will become Iraq.

Comey estimated that 250 persons from this country had traveled to Syria to fight in its terrorist war. The British estimate is between 850 and 2,000, the French estimate between 500 and 900, the German estimate at 750 and the Belgian estimate around 500 and the total EU estimate tops out at 4,200.

If they survive and return, thousands of trained enemy insurgents will be living in Europe. And they will be facing thousands of soldiers in the streets of major cities who have been deployed to fight them.

The first major wave of terror this century was fueled by Islamic terrorists who had fought in Afghanistan. The newest wave of terror will have insurgents trained in Iraq and Syria.

Supporters of refugee admissions and open borders are ushering in a military occupation and a civil war. There is no escaping these numbers or evading the facts on the ground that they represent.

But unlike Iraq or Syria, the Islamic insurgency is not an indigenous problem. The Islamic terrorist is not indigenous to America or Europe. He is a recent guest. He has been here for decades, not centuries. We can’t fix the tribal conflicts in Syria or Iraq, but we can interdict them through immigration reform.

Every effort to oppose President Trump’s travel pause is a vote for soldiers in the streets and car bombs every morning. It can only end with the wars that the left hated in Iraq and Afghanistan being fought in the cities where its activists, protesters and supporters live behind barbed wire and checkpoints.

Islamic terrorism is a war. The only way to stop that war is to stop migration from terror states today.

Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is a New York writer focusing on radical Islam.