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April 2016

Why Are Christians Leaving the Holy Land? by Lawrence A. Franklin

People who reflexively blame the wrong party for criminal acts are either misinformed or disingenuous.

The sad truth is that in the Palestinian territories, Christians are forced to live like dhimmis — second-class citizens who survive largely by the protection-money they are required to pay to buy their daily safety. These barely-tolerated citizens exist only at the whim and pleasure of the ruling Muslim majority. Muslim Arab discrimination against non-Muslims includes economic and socially prejudicial behavior that makes it difficult or impossible for Christian Arabs to run a profitable business or for their families to be fully integrated into society.

It is also appropriate for Catholics to raise with Vatican authorities the issue of Father Twal’s continued representation of the Faith in the Holy Land: Who is he serving first, God or man?

No one of good will, especially Catholics, wants to accuse a prominent member of his faith of being knowingly untruthful. The truth rarely is found in the Palestinian public narrative. But in case of the latest repetition of Father Fouad Twal, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, falsely blaming Israel for the ongoing spate of Palestinian violence against Israeli civilians, it appears certain from his consistent record of non-nuanced criticism of Israel, that he is motivated by a political bias.

Twal proclaimed that Israel’s alleged “occupation” of “Arab Palestine” is the cause of the murderous violence visited on Israeli civilians by Arab attackers — apparently “forgetting” that the Jews have lived in the region for nearly 4000 years. He was also apparently forgetting that the leaders of the Palestinian Authority (PA) have been glorifying such “acts of resistance” since the autumn of 2014. How can Twal ignore the reality that Palestinian media has been glorifying these knife attacks as “glorious feats.” In Palestinian schools, in fact, the attackers are hailed as heroes.

Turkey: The Business of Refugee Smuggling, Sex Trafficking by Uzay Bulut

Professional criminals convince the children’s parents that their daughters are going to a better life in Turkey. The parents are given between two and five thousand Turkish liras ($700-$1700) as “bride price” – an enormous sum for a poor Syrian family.

“Girls between the ages of twelve and sixteen are referred to as pistachios, those between seventeen and twenty are called cherries, twenty to twenty-two are apples, and anyone older is a watermelon.” — End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography and Trafficking of Children for Sexual Purposes (ECPAT)

“The most important question is why the refugee camps are not open to civil monitoring. Entry to refugee camps is not allowed. The camps are not transparent. There are many allegations as to what is happening in them. We are therefore worried about what they are hiding from us.” — Cansu Turan, a social worker with the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey (TIHV).

Many Muslims have difficulty with, or even an aversion to, assimilating into the Western culture. Many seem to have the aim of importing to Europe the culture of intimidation, rape and abuse from which they fled.

Although the desperate victims are their Muslim sisters and brothers, Arab states do not take in refugees. We have not seen any demonstrations with signs that read “Refugees Welcome!” The people in this area know too well that asylum seekers would bring with them problems, both social and economic. The only way they can think of helping women is to “marry” them.

On International Women’s Day, March 8, Turkish news outlets covered the tragic life and early death of a Syrian child bride. (source: )

Last August in Aleppo, Mafe Zafur, 15, married her cousin, Ibrahim Zafur, in an Islamic marriage. The couple moved to Turkey, but the marriage ended after six months, when her husband abruptly threw her into the street. With nowhere to sleep, Mafe found shelter with her brother, 19, and another cousin, 14, in an abandoned truck.

On 8 March, Mafe killed herself, reportedly with a shotgun. Her only possession, found in her pocket, was her handwritten marriage certificate.

Mafe Zafur is only one of many young Syrians who have been victims of child marriage. Human rights groups report even greater abuse which gangs are perpetrating against the approximately three million Syrians who have fled to Turkey.

Adam Andrzejewski: The “Pension Palace” for Illinois Lawmakers

Nobody knows how to game the system for personal gain like an Illinois lawmaker. The political class voted themselves tens of millions of dollars in lifetime pension payouts. It’s time end their ‘pension palace.’

Illinois lawmakers have one of the sweetest retirement deals on planet earth. It’s supposed to be a ‘part-time’ job in the general assembly, but now taxpayer funded legislator pension costs exceed most base salaries. Last year, taxpayers paid a whopping $71,818 per legislator ($15.8 million in FY2015) to fund their ‘golden parachute’ retirement plans. See the top all-time General Assembly Retirement System pensions here.
At OpenTheBooks.com, we looked at who’s receiving what, when and for how long. The results would make Public Enemy #1, the 1930s bank robber John Dillinger, blush. For example, the #1 all-time pension goes to a 31-year long-forgotten state senator. Retiring from Springfield in 2000, with a pension spiking stop at the Chicago schools, Arthur Berman (D) now takes $19,652 a month ($235,824) in annual pension – nearly four times more than he ever made as a Springfield lawmaker.
Here are just some of the Illinois lawmaker ‘big-dogs’ from both parties:

Retired Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley (D) makes $132,384 a year in state lawmaker pension – from a short eight-year ‘career’ as a state senator (plus some pension spiking tricks).
Former Governor Jim Edgar (R) costs taxpayers $337,816 per year: a $156,324 pension, plus an $181,492 salary (FY2013) at our flagship University of Illinois at Champaign.
In 2010, former Governor George Ryan (R) had a $197,028 annual pension ($16,419/month), but it was stripped away by the successful public corruption prosecution conviction.

Even former Speaker of the House Denny Hastert (R) cashed in for a $28,020 ($2,335/month) legislative state pension before heading off to his congressional career.

Both Democrats and Republicans have engineered a system of compliance and largesse – give no pain to party leadership and the lawmaker gets all the gain. As soon as lawmakers ‘retire,’ they move into a pension palace.

Of course, even the losers get into pension palace. Consider the ‘casualties’ of the 2014 elections:

GOOD NEWS FROM AMAZINGISRAEL FROM MICHAEL ORDMAN

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com

Two Israeli inventions can save the lives of stabbing victims.
Israeli ultrasound brain surgery has cured an Israeli of Parkinson’s.
An elite IDF unit is helping Arab-Israeli startups.
A Dubai woman named her son after the IDF officer that helped deliver him.
A new Israeli innovation keeps fruit and vegetables fresh.
Shh… an Israeli company helped the FBI unlock a terrorist’s iPhone.
A sale of $1.5 billion Israeli bonds was five times oversubscribed.
The BBC bought an Israeli story to base its new drama series about autism.
ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS

Preventing lung collapse. (TY Dan) Another innovation from Hebrew University of Jerusalem’s BioDesign students. They developed ThoraXS – a one-handed thoracic portal opener that shortens the procedure time of chest-tube insertion from minutes to less than 30 seconds. It is timely for saving victims of terror stabbings.
http://new.huji.ac.il/en/article/29654 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZ3fhZmgyiY

Stopping uncontrolled bleeding. Gallium is a bio-metal currently used to stop bone loss in cancer patients. Moshe Rogosnitzky, a researcher at Israel’s Ariel University, has discovered that Gallium in liquid form (known as gallium nitrate) can rapidly halt bleeding from deep wounds, without causing blood clots.
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/209371#.Vv53uUfn95R

Leukemia trial results. Latest reports of Phase II trials of BL-8040 from Israel’s Bioline Rx (see Nov newsletter), show that 38% of patients with acute myeloid leukemia, went into complete remission after just two cycles of the treatment. All these patients had previously failed to recover from other leukemia treatments.
http://www.globes.co.il/en/article-biolinerx-reports-positive-phase-ii-leukemia-drug-results-1001113425

How bacteria escape their enemies. A joint team of scientists at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and from the Netherlands have discovered that the common E. coli bacteria plays “hide and seek” to avoid detection from the predatory B. bacteriovorus bacteria. It extends research into combating antibiotic resistant bacteria.
http://new.huji.ac.il/en/article/29284 http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/283/1824/20152154

Gene enhances insulin production. Researchers at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have discovered that the gene p16 enhanced insulin secretion in beta cells of mice that suffer from diabetes, thereby partly reversing the disease and improving the health of the mice. Similar results in human cells are expected.
http://new.huji.ac.il/en/article/29587

Mending hearts again in Tanzania. Surgeons from Israel’s humanitarian organization Save A Child’s Heart returned to Tanzania in March to perform more life-saving operations on African children. (See July newsletter for previous mission) http://www.israel21c.org/healing-childrens-hearts-in-tanzania/

$25 million to fund new blood center. Israel’s emergency service Magen David Adom received its largest ever donation – $25 million – to build a new blood services center in Ramle. The Marcus National Blood Services Center will replace a facility in Tel Hashomer that is vulnerable to rocket attacks from Gaza.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/magen-david-adom-blood-center-gets-largest-donation-ever/

Exercise center for the brain. (TY Jacques) Swiss Ambassador to Israel Andreas Baum inaugurated Israel’s first BrainPath in Neve Eshkol, near Gaza. The fitness parlor, adjoined to the region’s largest senior citizen center, has eleven exercises that stimulate blood-flow to the brain. http://www.neveshkol.org.il/page_50511
http://israelbetweenthelines.com/index.php/2016/02/05/make-way-welcome-to-israels-first-real-brainpath/

China seeks Israeli remote health tech. Renming Zhu of China’s Truth Enterprises is seeking Israeli startups for its new incubator in Shanghai. Of particular interest are solutions to bring medical care out of the doctor’s office and into the field. China’s vast geography and aging population puts a huge strain on its healthcare costs.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-remote-health-tech-sought-for-chinas-healthcare-system/

Israeli woman cured of Parkinson’s. The focused ultrasound brain surgery of Israel’s Insightec has been used 500 times around the world. In its first procedure in Israel, surgeons at Haifa’s Rambam Medical Center successfully cured an Israeli woman of her uncontrollable shaking. (Video had 570,000 views in 2 days).
http://www.onlysimchas.com/news/28445/first-in-israel-surgery-that-removes-shaking-due-to-parkinson-disease

You Won’t Believe Why This Conservative University Professor Was Suspended INDEFINITELY By Philip Hodges

John McAdams – a conservative university professor in Wisconsin – has been suspended indefinitely for criticizing a fellow professor for not allowing debate about same-sex marriage in her classroom. McAdams may return to Marquette University as professor in January of 2017, only if he admits that he was “guilty.”

It all started at the Milwaukee, Wisconsin Catholic university in 2014 when a student recorded his encounter with his philosophy professor Cheryl Abbate regarding the issue of same-sex marriage. Abbate had told her class that the issue of “gay rights” was not up for debate, that “everybody agrees on this, and there is no need to discuss it.”

After class, the student discussed the issue with Abbate, but the professor eventually suggested to the student that he drop the course, adding that “some opinions are not appropriate, such as racist opinions, sexist opinions…You don’t have a right in this class to make homophobic comments.” She stated, “In this class, homophobic comments, racist comments, will not be tolerated.”

The conservative university professor John McAdams wrote a post on his blog Marquette Warrior in 2014 exposing the student-professor encounter and criticizing Abbate for her intolerance. He concluded, “Like the rest of academia, Marquette is less and less a real university. And when gay marriage cannot be discussed, certainly not a Catholic university.”

As I see it: Bewildered Britain still doesn’t get it : Melanie Phillips

The British still don’t understand that the UK and Europe have long funded and connived at not just Palestinian terrorism, but the incitement that causes it.What is that unfamiliar rustling in the British cultural undergrowth? It’s the sound of people suddenly acknowledging a problem with anti-Semitism.

For years, anti-Semitism in Britain was the prejudice that dared not speak its name. The hostility toward Israel endemic in educated circles was emphatically declared to have nothing whatever to do with hatred of Jews. Anyone who claimed a connection was denounced as “waving the shroud of the Holocaust” to silence legitimate “criticism” of Israel.

Jewish students have long run the gauntlet of vicious Israel- and Jew-hatred. “Israel apartheid” weeks, BDS motions and campus conferences declaring Israel is a “settler-colonial state” have morphed into intimidation, stigmatization and discrimination against Jews at university.

VIRTUALLY NO ONE outside the Jewish community has paid this any attention.

Now, though, unease has begun to seep into British national consciousness.

The reason is a shift in perspective. Israel is no longer seen as the world’s major flashpoint. The TV news is instead pumping images of Syrian atrocities and floods of displaced migrants into the living rooms of the nation.

Security officials repeatedly warn of the likelihood of coordinated Islamist attacks in Britain. The terrorist atrocities last year in Paris and most recently in Brussels have ratcheted up anxiety levels.

WHAT THE MEGA MOSQUE REPRESENTS IN AMERICA- JANET LEVY

To Turkish President Recip Erdogan’s dismay, Obama did NOT attend today’s opening of the Lanham, Maryland mega-mosque as expected. At the mosque inauguration, the stealth ISIS supporter and arch enemy of the Kurds lambasted “those who are defaming our faith” and singled out U.S. presidential candidates who are exposing the Islamic threat to America as “targeting Muslims.”

Erdogan defended Turkey’s efforts to fight terrorism and pledged to send the “true message of Islam across the globe.” Ironically, the Turkish leader has described his Islamic-supremacist government’s efforts to deliver weapons to Palestinian jihadists and thwart Israel’s blockade of Hamas-controlled Gaza as a “peace flotilla” and had the hubris to demand an apology from Israel for its “aggressive” interception of the operation. Under pressure from Obama, Israel was forced to oblige.

The Lanham, Maryland mosque is reputed to be the largest Islamic campus in the Western Hemisphere. Turkey has been busily building mega-mosques on five continents with planned mosque construction projects in Havana, Cambridge, Budapest, Bucharest, Haiti, and several other cities around the world. It appears that Erdogan, an aspiring Caliph, may be close to attaining his goal of reviving and leading the Neo-Ottoman Empire by 2023.

The Lanham mega-mosque, a $110 million project, housed on 15 acres, comprises a 20,000+ square foot mosque, a cultural center, guest houses, and an underground sports complex. (This begs the question, “Why underground?”)

The Washington, D.C. metropolitan area is reported to have the second largest Muslim population in the U.S. (conveniently located at the heartbeat of the country) with at least 25 mosques a.k.a. potential jihad training centers and weapons depots. With estimates from several studies (including the 2005 expose by Freedom House) claiming that over 80% of U.S. mosques are radicalized, doing the math indicates that 20 such facilities potentially threaten the seat of our government and beyond.

The land for the Lanham mega-mosque was originally purchased by Fetullah Gulen, an exiled Turkish cleric, who with over 150 schools, operates the largest charter school network in the United States. It was recently reported that Gulen is infiltrating the U.S. military by establishing publicly-funded schools to target the children of American service personnel. The radical cleric is currently negotiating with the U.S. Air Force to locate a charter school at Nellis Air Force Base with classes to begin in the 2016-2017 school year. As one of the largest national users of H1B* visas, Gulen is able to recruit Turkish Muslim teachers to staff his many schools. He retains a skilled stable of immigration lawyers to insure favorable visa decisions – 684 H1B visas in 2009 alone.

While Americans are busy focusing on other things – March Madness and Kim Kardashian to name a couple, the stealth jihad of over 60 years duration continues apace. In a relatively short time, the civilizational jihad has advanced to an unfathomable degree. Truly, the enemy within has cleverly achieved enormous success raising minimal awareness and relatively contained violence.

*(Beware: Several presidential candidates have called for increasing the number of H1B visas).

FUNDING ANTI-SEMITISM WITH TAXPAYER MONEY

NOTES FROM TOM GROSShttp://www.tomgrossmedia.com/mideastdispatches/

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/04/02/charity-backing-anti-israel-rallies-has-state-cash-pulled/

The (London) Sunday Telegraph reports today:

The [British] government has ceased funding a British charity which sponsored events accused of promoting hatred and violence against Jews.

The Department for International Development said that it no longer supported War on Want, which helped pay for “Israeli Apartheid Week” in February this year.

The statement comes as the Telegraph obtained undercover recordings of events where anti-Semitism, demands for the destruction of Israel or naked support for terror were expressed by academics and others at meetings in some of Britain’s most prestigious universities.

One speaker, Max Blumenthal, the son of a close adviser to Bill and Hillary Clinton, praised a massacre by Hamas as sending an “incredible message” and said that taking up arms should be “normal” for Palestinians. He compared Israel to the terrorist group Isil, describing it as “the Jewish State of Israel and the Levant, Jsil”.

At another rally – sponsored by War on Want – a speaker said that British government policy was created by “Zionist and neo-con lobbies”.

A second speaker at the same event spoke of a “rumour” that Israelis were harvesting dead Palestinians’ organs.

The meeting was held at London University’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS)… War on Want has received £260,000 in funding from the British government over the last two years.

BRITISH TAXPAYER MONEY GIVEN AS “REWARD” TO MURDERERS OF AN AMERICAN CHRISTIAN TOURISTS

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3520852/You-pay-two-Palestinian-terrorists-left-Britain-woman-dead-killed-friend-9-000-year-reward.html
[Note by Tom Gross]http://www.tomgrossmedia.com/mideastdispatches/

I attach two pieces below from today’s British newspapers, the Sunday Telegraph and the Mail on Sunday. (I helped advise both newspapers with these pieces.)

The Mail on Sunday (the Sunday edition of the Daily Mail, the world’s most read online newspaper) reports:

You, the British taxpayer, pay two Palestinian terrorists who left this British woman for dead and killed her friend £9,000 each every year – as a ‘REWARD’.

Kay Wilson was left for dead in an orgy of violence in Jerusalem in which Kristine Luken, an American, was killed by two Palestinian terrorists.

Reports revealed the assailants were being paid a monthly stipend equivalent to £750 each effectively from the Palestinian Authority (PA).

The Mail on Sunday exposed how ‘reward’ payments are going via the PA – which UK aid gives more than £24million each year – to terrorists

If you want to end the madness, you can sign the petition HERE [at the link below]

MUST SEE: PAT CONDELL-EUROPE’S BETRAYAL OF WOMEN

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIfMAP4Q1yk&feature=em-uploademail