RUTHFULLY YOURS

Hostility towards the Palestinian Authority (PA) seems to have reached unprecedented heights among refugee camp residents.

A chat with young Palestinians in any refugee camp in the West Bank will reveal a driving sense of betrayal. In these camps, the PA seems as much the enemy as Israel. They speak of the PA as a corrupt and incompetent body that is managed by “mafia leaders.” Many camp activists believe it is only a matter of time before Palestinians launch an intifada against the PA.

Nablus, the largest city in the West Bank, is surrounded by a number of refugee camps that are effectively controlled by dozens of Fatah gangs that have long been terrorizing the city’s wealthy clans and leading figures.

Hamas, of course, is cheering on the sidelines as it watches the PA-controlled territories going to hell.

Palestinians fear that their communities may be facing a return to anarchy and falatan amni, or “security chaos.”

Recent incidents are yet another sign of the Palestinian Authority’s failure to enforce law and order, especially in refugee camps such as Balata (near Nablus) Qalandya (near Ramallah) and the Jenin refugee camp.

Moreover, these incidents are an indication of mounting tensions among rival camps inside Fatah and between the refugees and the Palestinians living in the big cities surrounding the camps.

These camps, which are hotbeds for gunmen and terror groups, have long been off-limits to the Palestinian Authority (PA) security forces. Tens of thousands of Palestinians live in these three major refugee camps in the West Bank. Although the refugee camps there located in areas controlled by the PA, the Palestinian security forces do their best to steer clear of them. Attempts by Palestinian security forces to arrest camp residents wanted for various crimes have often resulted in armed confrontations.

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his fellow Islamists are keen admirers of the idea that Muslim Turks capture lands belonging to other civilizations because, in this mindset, “conquest” means the spread of Islam.

“Look, now there is the Islamophobia malady in the West … [Its] aim is to stop [the further spread of Islam]. But they will not be able to succeed.” — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, June 4, 2016.

In Erdogan’s narrative, Muslim Turks have never invaded foreign lands by the force of the sword. What they did was just conquering hearts. This is not even funny.

1071 is a very special year for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan — and his Islamist ideologues. Erdogan often speaks about his “2071 targets,” a reference to his vision of “Great Turkey,” on the 1000th anniversary of a battle that paved the Turks’ way into where they still live.

In 1071, the Seljuk Turks did not arrive in Anatolia from their native Central Asian steppes with flowers in their hands. Instead they were in full combat gear, fighting a series of wars against the Christian Byzantine [Eastern Roman] Empire and featuring a newfound Islamic zeal. The Battle of Manzikert in 1071 is widely seen as the moment when the Byzantines lost the war against the Turks: before the end of the century, the Turks were in control of the entire Anatolian peninsula.

Another divine date for Erdogan is May 29, 1453. That day saw the fall of Constantinople, capital of the Byzantine Empire, after an Ottoman army invaded what is today Istanbul, modern Turkey’s biggest city. The conquest of Constantinople was not a peaceful event either. The city’s siege lasted for 53 days and cost thousands of lives. The Byzantine defeat left the Ottoman armies unchecked, clearing the way for their advance into Christian Europe in the centuries to come. The long and violent Ottoman march into Europe came to a halt in 1683, when the Ottomans were defeated during the siege of Vienna. By then the Ottomans were in control of north Africa, most parts of the Middle East and central and eastern Europe, totaling 5.2 million square kilometers of land.

On every May 29, the Turks, proud of being — possibly — the world’s only nation that celebrates the capture by the sword of their biggest city from another civilization, take to the streets for grand ceremonies. The 563th anniversary of the conquest was celebrated with a major event created by a team of 1,200 people. It saw a 563-man Mehter concert [an Ottoman military band], a show by the Turkish Air Force aerobatics team, special conquest celebrations, a fireworks display, live broadcasts in six different languages and the world’s largest 3D mapping stage used to reenact the conquest.

It shouldn’t be so hard to grasp, nor would it be if modern journalists’ first instinct was not to report events as newsroom consensus prefers to frame them. A Muslim kills 49 people while screaming ‘Alahu Akbar’. Obviously, conservatives, gun owners and Islamophobes are to blame.
The only thing that perpetrators of major terrorist attacks have in common is their religion. That, and being total weirdos. Exhibit Z: Omar Mateen, self-proclaimed ISIS loyalist and, quite likely, a closeted homosexual. Neither is particularly unusual in itself, but taken together you get a pretty bizarre mental image: a leery, effeminate chanting “Allahu Akbar” to drown out the hot and guilty fantasies of man-on-man action that plague him. If this was a premiere screening at the Sundance Festival and not the backstory to a major terrorist attack, the character of Mateen might even provoke sympathy. Indeed, by the final scene, we could expect a happy ending, as he reconciled himself with his sexuality. They would probably call it Camelback Mountain.

No consensus has been reached on who exactly is to blame for Mateen’s actions. Republicans, in their predictable and reductive way, have blamed Mateen. Democrats, however, have been more creative. President Obama pointed the finger at Donald Trump, namely his proposed Muslim ban and use of the phrase radical Islam. (We can almost see Mateen, doing “research” on Grindr and polishing his AR-15, fuming: “I’ll show those bigots who doubt that Islam is a peaceful, moderate religion.”) The New York Times blamed Republicans more broadly, opining

While the precise motivation for the rampage remains unclear, it is evident that Mr. Mateen was driven by hatred toward gays and lesbians. Hate crimes don’t happen in a vacuum. They occur where bigotry is allowed to fester, where minorities are vilified and where people are scapegoated for political gain. Tragically, this is the state of American politics, driven too often by Republican politicians who see prejudice as something to exploit, not extinguish.

No mention that Mateen was a registered Democrat, but no surprise there?

In many ways, the Orlando shooting was a liberal dream come true. In their unflagging efforts to blame Muslim terrorist attacks on anyone but Muslim terrorists, they came up with the line some months ago that terrorists were “emotionally unstable” or something to that effect, and this death cult which has nothing to do with Islam (how could you even think such a thing?) was merely a convenient excuse to act on violent urges. That worked for a while, until the PC censors came to their senses and realized that blaming terrorism on mental illness is ableist. So they had to bin that line.

The Orlando shooting offered their old horse new shoes. Not only could they shift the blame away from the perpetrators – they could place it on the shoulders of their preferred scapegoat: conservative Republicans. Who is responsible for jihadism? Right-wing Christian patriots! It just rolls right off the tongue, doesn’t it?

That’s too bad, though. Besides being grossly inaccurate, the ableist excuse actually made a lot of sense. Like we said, these terrorists aren’t just fanatical ideologues. Most of them are also really sick puppies.

The father of a young woman killed in the Paris massacre last November is suing Google, Facebook Inc. and Twitter Inc., claiming the companies provided “material support” to extremists in violation of the law.

Reynaldo Gonzalez, whose daughter Nohemi was among 130 people killed in Paris, filed the suit on Tuesday in the U.S. District Court in the Northern District of California. The suit said the companies “knowingly permitted” the Islamic State group, referred to in the complaint as ISIS, to recruit members, raise money and spread “extremist propaganda” via their social-media services.

The Gonzalez lawsuit is similar to a case brought against Twitter in January by the widow of a contractor killed in an attack in Jordan. It includes numerous identical passages and screenshots, although the lawyers in the cases are different.

In statements, Facebook and Twitter said Wednesday that the Gonzalez lawsuit is without merit, and all three companies cited their policies against extremist material. Twitter said it has “teams around the world actively investigating reports of rule violations, identifying violating conduct, and working with law enforcement entities when appropriate.”

Facebook said if the company sees “evidence of a threat of imminent harm or a terror attack, we reach out to law enforcement.” CONTINUE AT SITE

BOSTON, England—The changing face of this east coast market town helps explain why many want to leave the European Union that Britain has spent the past 43 years helping to shape.

Resident Andrew Fraser said when Britons go to the polls on June 23 to vote on the country’s membership, he will be voting for Britain’s exit, or “Brexit,” because he believes a sharp rise in immigrants to Boston, where he has lived for most of his life, has radically transformed the town’s character.

“That’s not English, that’s not English, that’s not English,” the 57-year-old retiree said, gesturing to various shops around the town. “It’s all gone.”

Unease about immigration has been fueling anti-EU sentiment in the U.K., just as similar concerns have fostered frustration with political elites in the U.S. and across Europe.

In the U.K., rising immigration levels have galvanized debate about the country’s ties to the Continent. Britons uncomfortable about the rise in immigration blame EU membership for allowing unfettered arrivals from Europe. Others see the issue as an indication that Brussels has too much say over Britain in general, that the EU is unaccountable, and that membership, at £8 billion a year ($11.6 billion), is too costly.

A string of recent opinion polls suggest support has swung in favor of those campaigning to leave, with several surveys placing that camp in the lead. (See the results of the polls here.) The “leave” campaign’s focus on the immigration issue appears to be resonating with the public. CONTINUE AT SITE