RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19989/second-armenian-genocide

After besieging and starving 120,000 Armenians of the South Caucasus Republic of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) since December 2022, Azerbaijan launched a large-scale military offensive against Artsakh on September 19, subjecting the capital Stepanakert and other cities and villages to intensive fire using heavy artillery and drones.

“My Facebook feed is full of pictures of missing children since yesterday. Most of them were at schools when the Azerbaijani military attacked so they were separated from their families. The lack of electricity, mobile and internet disruptions complicate the search efforts.” — Anush Ghavalyan, journalist in Armenia, on X (formerly Twitter), September 20, 2023.

Artsakh has never been part of independent Azerbaijan. Artsakh — ruled by Armenian monarchs, and even by Persian rulers — has always preserved its Armenian identity.

Today, Azerbaijan is falsely claiming Artsakh as Azeri land, on the pretext that in the 1920s, Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, as part of his strategy of divide and conquer, decreed that Artsakh should be part of the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic as an autonomous oblast (province) even though Christian Armenia could not be less compatible with Muslim Azerbaijan.

“Failure to stand up to Azerbaijan could also result in an escalation that leads not only to the total destruction of the Armenians of Artsakh but also to a wider war in the region as Azerbaijan and its ally Turkey pursue territorial ambitions in southern Armenia and northern Iran.” — Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention, on X (Twitter), September 19, 2023.

The US government also has influence regarding Azerbaijan. President Joe Biden can discourage any such expansionist projects with one strong phone call to Azerbaijan’s President Aliyev, by urging him to stop the invasion of Artsakh and Armenia if he does not want serious consequences. Those could include U.S. sanctions on Azeri government officials and an end to U.S. military assistance to Azerbaijan. The latter would be consistent with the FREEDOM Support Act. The US should also send a humanitarian airlift to the starving population of Artsakh — consistent with America’s heralded tradition of aiding at-risk populations.

The frightening question is: Is the US internationally regarded as having leadership anymore?

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19965/turkey-air-force

The ambition of Turkish Aircraft Industries today is to build the first indigenous Turkish fighter jet, which could also be the world’s first Muslim fighter aircraft, and it has invited friendly nations Azerbaijan and Pakistan join the effort. Meanwhile Turkey is trying hard to support its assertive regional policy with military might.

There is a problem: With a fleet consisting mostly of ageing F-16s and a per capita income of barely $9,000 Turkey cannot play the role of a major power.

Echoing the neo-Ottoman ambition, Colonel Ümit Yalım (ret.) recently claimed that the sovereignty of Greece’s islands in the North Aegean Sea belongs to Turkey.

Erdoğan wants modern F-16s, while the U.S. Congress has a different opinion: Why give Turkey modern fighter jets if we want peace over the Aegean Sea? That leaves Turkey with one option: Make your own fighter aircraft.

Turkey’s ailing economy is experiencing high inflation (at 59% year-on-year), and the country’s external debt reached nearly $476 billion in March. The international credit insurance company Allianz Trade reported that the stock of Turkey’s total external debt due within the next 12 months has risen to about $250 billion.

Erdoğan made one wrong strategic choice — trying to align with Russia and America — and left Turkey’s top military planners pondering how to minimize the military and operational damage. The Turkish president should be able to understand that he cannot fully benefit from two clashing civilizations at his convenience.

Turkey, once NATO’s staunch southeastern flank sentinel against the Soviet Union, still operates the alliance’s second-largest military. These days, NATO’s second-largest military has a problem with its aerial firepower.

Turks are proud that their Air Force (TuAF) is the world’s ninth-largest. But it is not necessarily the ninth-strongest. According to the World Directory of Modern Military Aircraft, TuAF is not among the world’s top 15 militaries listed. Turkey has 110 attack helicopters and 205 fighter/interceptor aircraft, according to Global Firepower. But its fleet of 1,065 military aircraft includes no dedicated attack aircraft.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19980/palestinian-reverie

On August 29, 2023, Sheikh Issam Amira, a prominent member of the Palestinian Hizb al-Tahrir party, argued that the “liberation” of Palestine is nothing compared to the potentially great conquests that Islam has in store for the rest of the non-Muslim world — including the United States.

What crime did these non-Muslim cities, nations, and continents commit against Muslims to deserve being targeted for violent conquest?

“The Party of Satan is America, Europe, Russia, and all Western nations, and all infidel [non-Muslim] nations everywhere…. Everyone who opposes Allah and his prophet is to be stricken with disgrace and misery. Not just that, they are to be broken in the here, and sent to the fire in the hereafter.” — Sheikh Issam Amira, YouTube, August 29, 2023.

Although [Hizb al-Tahrir] means the “party of liberation,” and although it pretends its sole interest is “liberating” Palestinians from Israel, when its members get together there seems to be an additional plan, not just for Jews.

Palestinian cleric Nidhal Siam made clear that, from an Islamic perspective, for Christians as well, liberation and conquest are one and the same.

“Oh Muslims, the anniversary of the conquest [fath/فتح, literally, “opening”] of Constantinople brings tidings of things to come. It brings tidings that Rome will be conquered in the near future, Allah willing.” — Nidhal Siam, Jerusalem Post, January 20, 2020.

[The Palestinians] seek sympathy from the international community, despite the fact that until 1964, there reportedly were no Palestinians.

It also might be helpful to recall that until the seventh century and the birth of Muhammad, there were no Muslims – anywhere – let alone Palestinians.

The word Islam means “submission.”

“Fight those who do not believe in Allah and the Last Day, nor comply with what Allah and His Messenger have forbidden, nor embrace the religion of truth from among those who were given the Scripture, until they pay the tax, willingly submitting, fully humbled.” — Qur’an, 9:29 Khattab translation.

Those conquered are given three choices: to convert to Islam; to remain tolerated, second-class citizens, called dhimmis, pay a “protection” tax [jizya], and live according to humiliating rules to remind them of their inferiority, — such as being allowed to ride a donkey but not a camel or horse. The third choice is to die.

It is also helpful to remember that the Qur’an is not made up of “suggestions; Muslims consider it the word of God, similar to the Ten Commandments. One cannot say, “Oh, Allah didn’t really mean that.” Yes, Allah did…

In each of these military engagements, Muslims were the aggressors: they invaded non-Muslim territory and, apart from the Battle of Tours, which they lost, they butchered and enslaved the inhabitants, and appropriated their lands — for no other reason than that they were “infidels” — non-Muslims.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/eu-power-grab/

In case you missed it, September 13 was the big day – the occasion of the annual “State of the European Union” speech by European Commission President Ursula van der Leyen. Whether you voted for her or not – no, scratch that; unless you’re a member of the European Commission, which nominates its President, or the European Parliament, which chooses to ratify or reject the Commission’s selection, you can’t possibly ever have voted for her. Free and fair elections by the citizens of sovereign nations? Forget them! They’re so twentieth century. Don’t you realize that the European Union has moved far beyond such antiquated concepts, and is fast advancing toward a degree of international integration and power concentration – known in the EU lexicon as “democracy” – that it’ll make the likes of Klaus Schwab at the World Economic Forum pea-green with envy?

But before we get to van der Leyen’s speech – and to the not-to-be-missed response by Guy Verhofstadt – let’s go back briefly to the beginning. You know, of course, that the cause of European unity has a long and noble history. Napoleon did his best to bring it about in the early 1800s. A bit over a century later, Hitler gave it the old college try. After World War II, the Soviets would have had a go at it too, but the Western Allies were spoilsports. On the western side of the Iron Curtain, however, there quickly arose a postwar movement to unite Europeans under one government, whether Europeans themselves liked the idea or not. The name most intimately associated with this movement was Jean Monnet, a Frenchman from Chablis whose family business was the production of chablis and whose obsessive pursuit of European unity makes one wonder if he was guzzling too much chablis. To read about the life of this wine merchant, who became known as the “father of Europe,” is to learn about a career consisting of a long series of fancy-sounding jobs as international advisor, diplomat, and negotiator, of memberships on various blue-ribbon commissions, committees, and councils, and of the high-level hatching of various plans, projects, and programs. What you never come across is mention of an election. Because nobody ever voted for Monnet for anything.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2023/sep/17/iran-blocks-nuclear-inspectors-after-us-unfreezes-/

Iran began barring U.N. inspectors from nuclear sites over the weekend, days after the Biden administration freed up $6 billion in frozen funds in pursuit of a prisoner swap.

The development, which comes as Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi prepares for a visit to New York City to address the U.N. General Assembly, adds a fresh layer to rising tensions over Tehran‘s nuclear activities.

In a rare statement, U.N. nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi said Saturday that Iranian officials had informed him they will no longer permit certain International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors to conduct “essential verification work at the enrichment facilities in Iran which are under Agency safeguards

“Iran has effectively removed about one-third of the core group of the agency’s most experienced inspectors designated for Iran,” Mr. Grossi said.

The inspectors are in Iran to ensure compliance with the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. Mr. Grossi acknowledged that under the NPT, Iran is permitted to veto individual inspectors it does not agree with. But the IAEA chief said Tehran‘s latest move is unwarranted.

“I strongly condemn this disproportionate and unprecedented unilateral measure which affects the normal planning and conduct of agency verification activities in Iran and openly contradicts the cooperation that should exist between the agency and Iran,” he said.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19973/syria-on-verge-of-collapse

The country’s southern province of al-Suwayda’, whose population primarily comes from the Druze minority, is currently witnessing protests on an unprecedented scale.

There has also been a definite paradigm shift in these protests: … Calls for the government to resign, for the departure of President Bashar al-Assad and a political transition are now stronger and more prevalent.

However much one might sympathise with the protests, they are probably unlikely to shift the situation in a significant way. The protestors, although immensely courageous, are too few, and have little leverage.

The current status quo means that Syria is effectively divided into three major zones: the majority of the country that is held by the Damascus-based government backed by Russia and Iran; the northeast held by the American-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (the second largest zone of control); and parts of the northwest and north of the country on and near the border with Turkey, controlled by an assortment of insurgent factions that are backed by Turkey to varying degrees.

There is much debate about the causes of Syria’s economic downturn, but it seems clear that the decline can be attributed in significant part to the Syrian government’s economic isolation and its shortage of hard currency.

In the meantime, the Syrian government has no real solutions to its economic woes. It has been offering up measures such as increasing the salaries of state employees and military personnel while also raising the price for fuel.

Some impugn government corruption but consider criticism of Assad himself to be a red line: they seem to think that he is doing all he can to try to help the country — while being surrounded by corrupt officials.

It is nonetheless important to be realistic about what these protests can achieve. The protestors remain committed for now to sustaining a civil disobedience movement that is peaceful…. Moreover, the Syrian government is adopting a non-confrontational stance towards the protests. The government seems to have issued general directives to its security forces in the province to lie low and avoid opening fire or any repressive measures unless they are attacked.

There are really only two ways in which Assad can be brought down: either by being militarily overthrown (not being contemplated by any international power) or if the elites propping up his rule decide that his presidency is no longer worth preserving…[I]t seems that those closest to Assad who could bring about his removal from within are either largely unaffected by the situation or possibly even benefitting from it.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/chinese-spies-western-governments-united-kingdom-76c0c9b3?mod=opinion_lead_pos3

The United Kingdom this week has been roiled by alleged Chinese attempts to subvert the Parliament, including a report that a parliamentary staffer was arrested in March on suspicion of spying for Beijing. Such attempts to surveil and, worse, subvert democracies appear to have become standard practice for the Communist Party. Lawmakers the world over are on notice.

The staffer, whose arrest was first reported by the Times of London, ran an internal think-tank on behalf of a group of China-hawk lawmakers. This would have brought him into contact with senior members of Parliament, a variety of policy experts and activists, and journalists covering Sino-U.K. relations. The staffer said in a statement issued by his lawyer that he is “completely innocent” of the allegations.

Speaker of the Commons Lindsay Hoyle told lawmakers that the staffer’s arrest had been disclosed to senior officials around the time it happened in the spring. But backbenchers and the general public are right to ask whether keeping a lid on the story deprived them of opportunities to hold Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s administration accountable for its handling of this case and its China policy.

This week brought a separate report that MI5, the British domestic security service, advised the Conservative Party’s central headquarters to prevent two individuals from running for Parliament as the party was preparing candidate lists in 2021 and 2022, the Times reports. The individuals allegedly had links to Beijing’s United Front Work Department, a Communist Party organ engaged in influence operations abroad.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19960/china-taking-over-europe

Europe is in “complete denial” as China proceeds to spread its influence on the continent. At least that is the urgent, unequivocal view of Ivana Karásková, a Czech foreign influence specialist and a special adviser to European Commission Vice President Věra Jourová.

“Asked what parts of the Continent were most in the dark about Chinese influence, she added: ‘The whole of Western Europe is not looking. And yet there are cases that are so blatant.'”

In July 2023, the UK’s Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament released a comprehensive report on China’s threat to the country, and how the Communist power seeks both political and economic influence.

The Committee found that China had “successfully penetrate[d] every sector of the UK’s economy,” and that “the Government has been so keen to take Chinese money that it has not been watching China’s sleight of hand.”

“China sees almost all of its global activity in the context of what it sees as the struggle between the United States and China, and therefore it sees the United Kingdom fundamentally through that optic. China aspires to split off from the United States countries which it thinks might be detachable, and they sometimes have a sunnily optimistic view about which countries might be susceptible to that treatment. I would say that that was their single biggest issue with the United Kingdom.” — Sir Julian Lewis, Chairman of the UK’s Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament, July 13,2023.

China’s influence in the UK… reaches deep into the government, as well. Despite all of the above “the Government does not want there to be any meaningful scrutiny of sensitive investment deals” with China according to the report.

Meanwhile, the UK Foreign Office reportedly told UK government officials not to use the term “hostile state” about China in order not to offend the Communist country. The term, the Foreign Office said, should not be used in documents and internal messages via email and WhatsApp between advisers, civil servants and ministers.

“[T]he PRC’s influence is significantly higher in Germany than comparable European countries.” — The China Index 2022, an independent organization that tracks Chinese influence worldwide.

“A key concern is the high level of uncritical research cooperation between Germany and China, including in sensitive technological and military areas, which is one of the highest and among the most ‘captured’ globally… Huawei, BGI, ZTE, Hisilicon (Huawei-owned) and other Chinese companies collaborate with and fund projects at German universities and research institutions. Huawei alone has entered into at least 120 cooperation projects over the last 15 years, with annual budgets between 25,000-290,000 euros per project. The real number is unclear, as German universities sometimes cite their ‘academic freedom’ to refuse to answer freedom of information questions….” — The China Index 2022.

There are “90 Chinese groups in Germany with direct ties to the United Front bureaucracy in China…. Add on about 80 Chinese Student and Scholar Associations, more than 20 Confucius Institutes and classrooms, a dozen united front-aligned, Chinese-language media…an as yet unknown number of “Chinese Aid Centers”… and the phenomenon is both large and complex. There are hundreds of groups working in Germany to maintain the CCP’s ideology, values, language and goals…. from the grassroots to the elite. Europe-wide, these groups are embedded throughout civil society…and likely number over a thousand, since they are present… in every country.” — Didi Kirsten Tatlow, China expert, synopsis.cz, February 10, 2019.

“The decision to join the Silk Road [Belt and Road Initiative] was an improvised and atrocious act,” Italian Defense Minister Guido Crosetto said recently.

“The Chinese Communist Party has always forged links with politicians from countries whose positions…they wished to influence.” — Paul Charon and Jean-Baptiste Jeangène Vilmer, “Chinese Influence Operations: A Machiavellian Moment,” October 2021.

“The CCP also seems very active within the Italian political class, targeting the M5S [Five Star Movement] in particular.” — Paul Charon and Jean-Baptiste Jeangène Vilmer, “Chinese Influence Operations: A Machiavellian Moment,” October 2021.

“In France, as much as anywhere else, the Party has forged strong relationships with individuals enabling China to infiltrate the political sphere, defend its interests and silence critical voices…. Beyond individuals punctually and diversely recruited by the Party, the construction of a Chinese network within the French elite runs through the France-China Foundation since 2013.” — Paul Charon and Jean-Baptiste Jeangène Vilmer, “Chinese Influence Operations: A Machiavellian Moment,” October 2021.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19961/china-ceo-whisperers-chinese-communist-party

“I was pretty dismayed at the extent of Chinese Communist Party (CCP) influence in the federal Parliament. I should probably not say any more to stay on the right side of the libel laws… [W]hat are the authorities doing about this? I think that’s the real measure of China’s influence.” — Australian professor Clive Hamilton, National Post, April 15, 2019.

Despite leaked intelligence reports about Chinese interference in Canada’s last two federal elections in 2019 and 2021, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has refused to hold a public probe into the matter.

[T]he passivity of Trudeau’s Liberal Party is “permitting China to colonize Canada.” — Tasha Kheiriddin, Canadian political columnist, National Post, August 22, 2023.

“On housing: Chinese money laundering inflated Canadian property values for decades and helped push home ownership out of reach for today’s buyers. On drug addiction: China is the main source country of fentanyl found in Canada, paving the way for thousands of overdose deaths. On the economy: China has targeted a host of Canadian industries for control, from lobsters to lithium.” — Tasha Kheiriddin, National Post, August 22, 2023.

“The CCP’s basic strategy of overseas influence and interference is to capture elites in politics, business, media, think tanks, universities, and cultural institutions…It deploys a range of techniques including flattery, financial inducement, exploitation of anti-racist and anti-American sentiment, bribery, and honey traps… Key figures in the Liberal Party have long historical ties to the CCP, not least through business connections…” — Clive Hamilton, thehub.ca, June 2, 2023.

“I’ve often said that Chinese leaders are what I call CEO whisperers, they’re very, very skillful when meeting foreigners, particularly senior foreigners. China inspires a kind of excessive affection in people and an excessive sense of wonder and a desire not to apply the usual sort of critical thinking skills, and people are seduced by it.” — Former Canadian Ambassador to China David Mulroney, thehub.ca, June 2, 2023.

China has reportedly openly been trying to influence [Canadian PM] Justin Trudeau for the past ten years. One unnamed CSIS source said that the CCP had its eyes on Justin Trudeau well before he became prime minister.

Trudeau, during his first election campaign in 2016, visited the homes of “wealthy Chinese-Canadians for private fundraising events. Some of the hosts had close connections with the CCP and had been actively promoting Beijing’s takeover of islands in the South China Sea.” — Professor Clive Hamilton, in his book, Hidden Hand: Exposing How the Chinese Communist Party is Reshaping the World.

The influence of the CCP is so pervasive that Canada’s minister of environment, Steven Guilbeault, at the same time as being Canadian minister, is also an “official adviser to the Chinese government.” – torontosun.com, August 16,

China…is a real threat to Canada’s sovereignty. “Recent Chinese actions and announcements are pointing to Beijing’s determination to have a military capability in the region that will exceed that of Canada.” — Rob Hueber, senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute and associate professor of political science at the University of Calgary, theglobeandmail.com, August 25-27, 2023