RUTHFULLY YOURS

Louis René Beres, professor of political science and international law at Purdue University, is the author of many books and articles on nuclear strategy and nuclear war, including several very early works on nuclear terrorism. He received his Ph.D. at Princeton.

It would seem preposterous to connect the United Nations General Assembly and genocide in causal terms, but this link is plausible today. On December 2, the world body overwhelmingly endorsed a plainly one-sided resolution, calling upon Israel to renounce possession of nuclear weapons, and, simultaneously, to join a Nuclear Weapons Free-Zone for the Middle East. Should Israel ever feel compelled to abide by such a carefully contrived proposal, it would immediately become complicit in its own planned disappearance.

Almost from the beginning, when first Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion saw the primary need for a “great equalizer,” Israel’s core security as a beleaguered state has depended upon nuclear weapons. Although still ambiguous and still undisclosed, this Israeli “bomb in the basement” has managed to keep a substantial number of potentially existential enemies at bay. And while it was never a suitable deterrent against historically “normal” wars, or acts of terrorism, this available nuclear option has successfully thwarted what enemy states have expressly wanted most of all – that is, in the precise words commonly favored in such recurrent Arab and/or Iranian pleas, a “liquidation of the Zionist Entity.”

Significantly, from the standpoint of Israel’s enemies, there has never been any ambiguity. Presently, with Iran approaching full and effectively unobstructed membership in the Nuclear Club – a manifestly disingenuous approach, one assumed in stunning defiance of its nuclear non-proliferation treaty obligations – nuclear weapons and strategy have become indispensable to Israel’s physical survival.

“Mass counts,” wrote the classic Prussian military theorist, Carl von Clausewitz, and only Israel’s enemies have mass. Each year, without fail, these determined enemies call sanctimoniously for some form or other of Israeli denuclearization. Now, it is high time to acknowledge that nuclear weapons are never truly evil in themselves, and that their potential harmfulness is contingent upon which individual state or alliance is in control. In certain circumstances, as should be cartographically obvious to anyone who can see that Israel is less than half the size of America’s Lake Michigan, these weapons can be vital to self-defense and population survival.

ERIN GO ANTI-SEMITIC?…RSK

A furore has broken out in Ireland after organizers of the forthcoming Holocaust Memorial Day on January 27 decided to ban any mention of Israel at the event.

“The trustees of Holocaust Educational Trust Ireland (HETI) have instructed the host of the country’s main Shoah memorial event in January ‘not to refer to the Jewish State or the State of Israel during any part of the ceremony,’” the London-based Jewish Chronicle newspaper reported.

The ban follows a similar bar imposed just days before this year’s Holocaust Memorial Day in Ireland, when long-standing host Yanky Fachler was told to avoid mentioning Israel, the JC said.

He reluctantly complied when his objections fell on deaf ears but, afterwards, complained in writing to the organising body, HETI – only to be told the rule will again apply at January’s event at Dublin’s Mansion House.

Six days later, Fachler received a letter from HETI chair Peter Cassells telling him he was being replaced after 12 years in the job.

“I felt like I’d been hit very hard in my stomach,” Fachler said. The HETI decision “plays directly into the hands of everyone who doesn’t like Jews or Israel and I find it very sad that apparently the two Jewish members of the board did this,” he said.

The JC noted that Alan Shatter, a Jewish politician and former Justice and Equality Minister, “emphatically denied” that he had asked for Fachler to be sacked at a meeting with HETI to review the Holocaust commemoration event.

“I’m concerned that board members of HETI have been influenced in how they’re approaching this issue by the hostility towards Israel in some sections of Irish public discourse and by the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement,” Shatter told the JC, after describing Fachler as an “outstanding” Master of Ceremonies.

The liberal narrative is that fighting back against Muslim terrorists just makes them attack us. It’s best to just throw up our hands.

The Senate Torture report was supposed to prove their point by inciting Muslim violence. But no particularly special violence has arrived.

A desperate CBS based its entire claim of Muslim outrage on one guy from Twitter who wasn’t even outraged by it. It’s a sad state of affairs when CBS can’t even find an angry Muslim.

At the Daily Beast, Dean Obeidallah tries to explain why Muslims aren’t outraged.

There are two reasons why the torture report has resulted in nothing more—to date—than a few public condemnations and a slew of snarky tweets by ISIS supporters using the hashtag…

First, people across the Middle East have seen their own governments employ horrible forms of torture for years. It’s one of the oppressive techniques utilized by their respective leaders to remain in power…

The second, and what I see as the bigger reason for a collective shrug from the Muslim world, was what we didn’t see in the report. There were no allegations that the jailers engaged in desecrating Islam.

The common denominator in the most violent protests against Western actions has been when Islam had been insulted.

Dean’s various excuses and attacks on America and Israel aside, his two reasons are correct. What he doesn’t say is that…

Can any American who has been force fed videos of young men being beheaded by Islamic barabarians, who lived through the national grief of 9/11 be persuaded by McCain’s blather? He was a lousy candidate and a fool who paved the way for the victory of the worst president in American history….rsk
Senator McCain: ‘Torture is a stain on our national honor’
Senator John McCain (R-AZ) delivered the following statement on the floor of the U.S. Senate on December 9 concerning the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report on CIA interrogation methods:

“Mr. President, I rise in support of the release – the long-delayed release – of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s summarized, unclassified review of the so-called ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ that were employed by the previous administration to extract information from captured terrorists. It is a thorough and thoughtful study of practices that I believe not only failed their purpose – to secure actionable intelligence to prevent further attacks on the U.S. and our allies – but actually damaged our security interests, as well as our reputation as a force for good in the world.

“I believe the American people have a right – indeed, a responsibility – to know what was done in their name; how these practices did or did not serve our interests; and how they comported with our most important values.

“I commend Chairman Feinstein and her staff for their diligence in seeking a truthful accounting of policies I hope we will never resort to again. I thank them for persevering against persistent opposition from many members of the intelligence community, from officials in two administrations, and from some of our colleagues.

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http://www.tothepointnews.com/content/view/6120/150/Welcome to this morning’s headline. It’s hard to imagine more nauseating news, confirming all of our suspicions about what Rino rectum sellout corrupt scumbags are John Boehner and the House GOP leadership.

The $1.1 trillion bill dubbed the “Cromnibus” but which the HFR calls the Crapnibus passed last night (12/11) by 219-206, a margin of 13 votes. The vote was 162R-57D Yes, 67R-139D No. That means if just 7 more Pubs had the spine to stand up to Boehner, the bill would have been defeated, 213-212.

What’s more, the dreaded Shutdown would be blamed on the Democrats, as the No vote would have been lopsided 74R-139D. Indeed, Pelosi argued for a Shutdown and No vote on the House floor yesterday.

This destroys Boehner’s cowardly argument that Pubs had to pass the bill and avoid a Shutdown for which they would be blamed. It is now clear that Boehner and the GOP Establishment is in collusion with Zero to grant unconstitutional amnesty to millions – uncountable millions with subsequent chain migration – of illegal non-Americans.

As the linked article at the top explains:

“Fueled by Boehner’s money, Obama’s amnesty will provide work-permits, federal aid, Social Security cards and drivers’ licenses to millions of illegal immigrants, who will be able to compete against blue-collar worker – including many who voted Democrat in 2014 – for decent jobs.”

Daryl McCann A State of Apocalyptic Psychosis The fantasy that a Palestinian mini-state in the West Bank will “solve” the Middle East’s problems is wearing thin, especially with Egypt no longer on board. The long, sad history of Arab rejectionism has made sure of that

Peter Smith’s splendid Quadrant Online essay, “Dancing at the Wailing Wall”, quotes a Palestinian terrorist: “There will be one country from the Mediterranean to the Jordan River.” Though usually not one to agree with Islamic militants, I think our anti-Zionist freedom fighter has got this one right. For the foreseeable future – okay, until the end of time – there will be only one country between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River. And its name shall be Israel.

The so-called “two-state solution” is dead. Truth be told, the notion of transforming the West Bank (also known as Judea and Samaria) into an Arab Palestinian state has always been a minority view. Haj Amin al-Husseini (1897-1974), the religious and political leader of the Arabs who inhabited British Mandatory Palestine, did not care for it. While he retained any kind of authority, at least, he never aspired to an Arab Palestinian state – neither the maximalist Jordan-to-the Mediterranean version nor the minimalist West Bank adaptation.

In the aftermath of the break-up of the Ottoman Empire, al-Husseini rejected the idea of an autonomous Palestinian entity and instead insisted that the Arabs of the region (formerly known as southern Ottoman Syria) be absorbed into an independent Greater Syria. Come the Second World War, Haj Amin al-Husseini did not conspire in Berlin to become President of Palestine but Supreme Leader of a Nazi-sanctioned, Judenfrei, transnational Islamic state with Jerusalem as the capital – not so much a two-state solution as an integral part of the Final Solution. In al-Husseini’s day, the term “Palestine” was associated with Zionism. Until May 16, 1948, the day after the foundation of the State of Israel, The Jerusalem Post was known as The Palestine Post. An Arab Palestinian flag, an Arab Palestinian identity and an Arab Palestinian nation are all recent innovations.

This excellent and thoughtful column is about mis-education in Australia, but so applicable to the academies in America….rsk

While textbook pages are devoted to Karl Marx, to socialism and the struggle of the working man, nineteenth-century liberalism is almost totally neglected. How is it possible to omit so much, remembering always that this excision is but one of many in the systematic stripping of the past

It was once the case that the political and constitutional history of England and Australia dominated the study of history in schools. But since the mid-1980s historians have largely abandoned these matters for social history. While the apostles of social history might say that what they have to offer is a gain, and it is, the arrival of this new history has also had the effect, intended or not, of crowding out political and constitutional history.

The social history approach does not always enhance our understanding of the past, for it produces a very odd account of the past when it stumbles into areas where it lacks understanding. Take slavery. According to the History 9 textbooks, slavery in the British Empire was abolished as the result of a social movement. Now while such a movement was very influential it was not in itself sufficient; legislation was required to abolish slavery in the British Empire in 1833.[1] The failure to mention this might create the impression that somehow it just went away because people protested. This is a typically adolescent view of social change and ignores the complex ways change actually occurs. [2]

It would help students to know that in 1772 the English courts declared slavery unlawful in England when the Court of King’s Bench set free a Virginia slave who had been brought to England, on the basis that there was no slavery in England.[3] The case was cited and applied in a habeas corpus case involving the illegal detention of an Aboriginal boy in New South Wales in 1861.[4] Students should also know that the Governor of New South Wales declared in 1788 that Australia would not permit slavery.[5]exhibition building

The regimes of Turkey, Iran, and Syria all have large Kurdish minorities, and apparently do not want Kurds within their states to seek either autonomy or union within an independent Iraqi Kurdistan, and view an independent Kurdistan as a possible ally for Israel.

ERBIL — There is a sense of unity throughout Iraqi Kurdistan. The two political rivals, which have controlled Kurdistan’s politics for decades, appear to have “buried the hatchet” deep enough to withstand any continuing differences over policy and tribal interests. The Kurdistan Democratic Party [KDP], which represents the Barzani Clan, and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan [PUK], which represents the Talabani Clan, remain well represented in the parliament with the KDP controlling 38 out of 111 seats and the PUK 18.[1]

There is little public mention of this past rivalry; here, clan-centered local politics seems to have been replaced by a grander vision of a future independent Republic of Kurdistan. The only major decision regarding this future development is the question of the proper timing for the declaration. There are, however, a few variables that may delay the birth of this new, non-Arab state in the Middle East.

One variable is the fate of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant [ISIL]. The Kurds appear to have regained their self-confidence after a late-summer scare when ISIL forces inflicted a series of defeats on Kurdistan’s peshmerga troops. American bombing raids, Iranian Qods Force volunteers, and pro-Iranian Shia militia helped stabilize the military landscape even as Western investors fled the region.

Another variable is U.S. State Department pressure on the Kurds to remain within the Iraqi state. It appears that economic reality combined with American persuasion have succeeded in postponing the birth of the Kurdish nation-state.[2]

On Tuesday evening, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro delivered the keynote address at a conference on “America’s Standing in the World” held at Bar-Ilan University’s Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies. In his speech, Shapiro warned Israelis not to assume that the results of last month’s midterm elections have made his bosses in Washington powerless in pressing for Palestinian statehood.

“Here is a caution, lest anyone jump to conclusions,” he said. “Divided government, in which one party controls Congress and the other the Executive Branch, does not necessarily mean foreign policy gridlock.”

On the contrary, he added, “Presidents often surge and engage even more intensively in national security affairs in their final years in office.”

Don’t worry, Mr. Ambassador. Israel is under no illusions on that score. Obsessions die hard, after all. And an American administration that is enabling Iran to laugh its way to nuclear armament (among other international catastrophes) has but one piece of low-hanging fruit to pick — and pick on — before going down in history as the disaster it has been all along.

Nothing new there.

Nor was it a surprise that the State Department rushed to dispel rumors, based on a Haaretz report earlier this month, that the U.S. was about to threaten Israel with sanctions over settlement construction. Though neither the Obama administration nor the extreme left-wing Israeli newspaper is trustworthy, in this case, the latter sounded plausible — which goes to show how much faith Israel has lost in its strongest ally.

It is in this context that two recent events must be taken. One is the fall of the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on December 2, paving the way for new elections in March. The other is the death of senior Palestinian Authority official Ziad Abu Ein on Wednesday.

Netanyahu’s coalition collapsed as a result of internal battles regarding the so-called “peace process” — a euphemism for an Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 borders. To put it simplistically, the key divide that separates the two main parliamentary blocs concerns the issue of whether the onus for a peaceful two-state solution rests on Israel. Those who believe it does understand American pressure. Those who pay attention to Palestinian words and deeds — which jibe with global jihad — view the Jewish state as under assault.